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NEWS BULLETIN & ALMANIACAL ARCHIVES
Also see NevadaLabor.com's Statewide U-News RoundupClick here to get on our news & bulletins mailing list...
But before you do so, please read this note. —AB[[EDITOR'S NOTE: Unless otherwise noted, historical items appear courtesy of longtime Nevada reporter Dennis Myers' Poor Denny's Almanac [PDA]. Items highlighted in blue are of interest to labor in particular and seekers of justice in general. Red means war. Copyright © 2011, 2012 Dennis Myers. More Myers.]]
Jump to more 2012 Breaking News, Bulletins & Almanac
The Ides of March 2012
Ecce Cesar!UPDATE ON THE IDES OF MARCH, Thursday, 15 March 2012, 12:27:09 a.m. PDT, 07:27:09 ZULU/GMT/SUT/CUT — On this date in 44 BC, Roman military dictator Julius Caesar was assassinated; in 1939, The Third House, a satirical show about Nevada legislators staged by legislative attachés, was held for the 1939 session with only the Assembly participating; in 1945, the King Cole Trio was number one in the first Billboard magazine albums chart (Nat Cole later abandoned jazz for MOR ballad singing, but his trio's recordings are still widely admired); in 1954, The Chords (one of the "hallway groups" that harmonized in school, on streetcorners, or in the subway) recorded Sh-boom as the B-side of a 78 record on the Cat label, setting off the doo-wop era (unfortunately, a white group called The Crew Cuts quickly covered the Chords version, draining away the Chords' earnings and their hit); in 1956, My Fair Lady opened on Broadway; in 1957, a one-day delay in delivery of a gambling regulation bill to Governor Russell six days before the end of the 1957 legislature raised questions of whether the governor had to act on it before the end of the session or could wait until after the lawmakers went home, which would determine whether the '57 or '59 legislature would vote on overriding a veto; in 1988, a four-day battle began in the area of Halabja on the Iran/Iraq border during which the city was gassed by what the Reagan administration said was an Iranian attack (fourteen years later, the second Bush administration changed that story as part of its campaign for war, claiming the attack was launched by Saddam Hussein's forces, then charging that "he gassed his own people"). [EDITOR'S NOTE: In a 1991 report which appeared after the Kuwait/Gulf War and was thus ignored, the San Francisco Chronicle published an extensive article with expert analysis from the U.S. Army War College concluding that the dead had not been gassed at all.]
César Chávez Celebration X
Saturday / March 31, 2012 / Circus Circus-RenoCésar Chávez X Celebracion
sábado 31 DE Marzo, 2012 en Circus Circus de Reno
Sponsorship & Ticket Information
Purchase online thru E-Bay's secure PayPal service
Obama pays tribute to late Reno labor leader
THE WAY WE WERE — The above is a recently discovered photo from July 15, 1986. Left to right are Kathy Brown, Culinary Union Local 86 office manager; Miguel Contreras, Local 86 Secretary-Treasurer; Local 86 President Bill Uehlein; a lady named Natalie (anyone who knows her last name, please write), and César Chávez. This item was first published in Ahora, northern Nevada's Spanish-English weekly, on March 26, 2008. (On 3-19-2009, President Obama paid tribute to Brother Contreras as he spoke in the L.A. building named after the late labor leader. See the 1986 Chávez Reno archive, below.)
(Photo courtesy of Dan Rusnak, retired business manager of Laborers' Union Local 169.)
More stories and photos from César Chávez's 1986 Reno visit
More sucker punches from Lush Rambo
Barbwire by Barbano/ Expanded from the 3-11-2012 Daily Sparks TribuneCorpo-Dems, Labor-Greens and golden mensches
Also: Jeanmarie Simpson previews her new play in Reno March 9, Carson City March 10
Barbwire by Barbano/ Expanded from the 3-4-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
Leaping back to the future
Update: WEDNESDAY, 29 FEB. 2012, 3:41 a.m. PST, 11:41 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT — On this date in 1968, President Johnson's National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders (also known as the Kerner Commission) warned that racism was causing America to move "toward two societies, one black, one white — separate and unequal." (New York Times)
This bitch just isn't sexy enough
A domestic cartel fixes the price of gasoline
while politicians say nothing can be done and media sit shiva.
Such is BigOil's power to intimidate while hiding in plain sight.
Barbwire by Barbano/ Expanded from the 2-26-2012 Daily Sparks TribuneDemocrats helped elect Republicans Halseth and Heck
By David McGrath Schwartz / 2-22-2012 Las Vegas SunRed line in a new bottle:
We are caged for slaughter in an electronic zoo
Expanded from the 2-19-2012 Daily Sparks TribuneBarbano back on statewide Nevada Newsmakers TV/radio program
God herself decrees every sperm is sacred
Plus: Bogus Beach Boys Grammy Awards claim
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 2-12-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
Update: SATURDAY, 11 FEB. 2012, 01:59:50 a.m. PST, 09:59:50 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT — On this date in 1870 at the Carson City branch of the U.S. Mint, the first coin (a seated liberty dollar) was struck; in 1916, Reno's Twentieth Century Club heard author Jean Morris Ellis (Character Analysis) speak on eugenics; in 1937, General Motors signed an epochal agreement recognizing the United Auto Workers and protecting striking workers from prosecution after plant workers seized the Fisher Body plant in Flint, Mich., and held it for 44 days but AFL President William Green, who was not involved, condemned the settlement as a defeat for labor: "All the laboring men of the country have been injured by the General Motors settlement" (and in D.C., a U.S. Senate committee revealed that GM had paid nearly half a million dollars over two years — about $6,900,000 in 2005 dollars — to the union-busting Pinkerton Detective Agency); in 1942, Nevadan Karetaro Ishii of Sparks was fired from his job with the Southern Pacific Railroad after 22 years (he was rehired the day after the war ended); in 1962, former Nevada assemblymember and senator Newt Crumley, who brought big name entertainment to the Commercial Hotel in Elko in 1941 and later owned the Holiday Hotel in Reno, died in a plane crash; in 1969, Corporal Thomas Bennett, a medic, was killed while trying to rescue a fellow soldier, the end of two days of heroic actions for which he received the Medal of Honor, the only conscientious objector so honored during the Vietnam war (see citation below); in 1979, followers of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini came to power when Iranian Prime Minister Shapur Bakhtiar stepped down after serving for 37 days following dictator Reza Pahlavi's flight from the country (during those 37 days Bakhtiar dismantled the hated Savak secret police).
Thomas Bennett
CitationFor conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity in action at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty. Cpl. Bennett distinguished himself while serving as a platoon medical aidman with the 2d Platoon, Company B, during a reconnaissance-in-force mission. On 9 February the platoon was moving to assist the 1st Platoon of Company D, which had run into a North Vietnamese ambush, when it became heavily engaged by the intense small arms, automatic weapons, mortar and rocket fire from a well fortified and numerically superior enemy unit. In the initial barrage of fire, 3 of the point members of the platoon fell wounded. Cpl. Bennett, with complete disregard for his safety, ran through the heavy fire to his fallen comrades, administered life-saving first aid under fire and then made repeated trips carrying the wounded men to positions of relative safety from which they would be medically evacuated from the battle position. He valiantly exposed himself to the heavy fire in order to retrieve the bodies of several personnel. Throughout the night and following day, Cpl. Bennett moved from position to position treating and comforting the several personnel who had suffered shrapnel and gunshot wounds. On 11 February, Company B again moved in an assault on the well fortified enemy positions and became heavily engaged with the numerically superior enemy force. 5 members of the company fell wounded in the initial assault. Cpl. Bennett ran to their aid without regard to the heavy fire. He treated 1 wounded comrade and began running toward another seriously wounded man. Although the wounded man was located forward of the company position covered by heavy enemy grazing fire and Cpl. Bennett was warned that it was impossible to reach the position, he leaped forward with complete disregard for his safety to save his comrade's life. In attempting to save his fellow soldier, he was mortally wounded. Cpl. Bennett's undaunted concern for his comrades at the cost of his life above and beyond the call of duty are in keeping with the highest traditions of the military service and reflect great credit upon himself, his unit, and the U.S. Army.
Update: FRIDAY, 10 FEB. 2012, 2:53:20 p.m. PST, 10:53:20 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —VALENTINES FOR VETERANS
VAlentines (10 Feb. 2012) — Nevada Alliance for Retired Americans/Gail Bishop Chapter VA Valentine Volunteers begin their rounds at the Reno VA Medical Center. Left to right are VAVol Carol Mark, former Nevada State Board of Education member Peggy Lear Bowen, Miss UNR Ashton Sunsiri, VAVol Dean Schermerhorn, NARA event coordinator Gail Dietrich (seated), VAVol Nelson Dietrich, Miss Reno/Sparks & Miss UNR Pageant Director Shirley Lunsford and Miss Reno/Sparks Madeline Burak.
VALENTINE SURPRISE (10 Feb. 2012) — Specialist David Barajas, Jr., home on two weeks' leave, wanted to surprise his mother and ended up with quite a surprise himself. David not only got a Valentine, he also got an up-close-and-personal photo with Miss Reno/Sparks Madeline Burak, left, and Miss University of Nevada Ashton Sunsiri, right. David is a 2008 graduate of Reno High School and a member of the Nevada Army National Guard's 485th Military Police Company stationed in Afghanistan.
His mom, Blue Star Mother Elizabeth Barajas, works in quality management at the hospital.
Valentines were produced by local artist Susan Sullivan and were distributed to each of the roughly 100 inpatients at the Ioannis A. Lougaris Veterans Administration Medical Center.
And to one surprised veteran who was surprising his mom.[EDITOR'S NOTE: The above photo and an expanded version of this story appeared on page 3-D of the Sunday, 2-19-2012 Reno Gazette-Journal.]
REPORT FROM GAIL DIETRICH (10 Feb. 2012) — We had a wonderful morning. The beauty queens are not only stunningly pretty, but they are both on scholarships. Miss UNR is majoring in international affairs and politics and Miss Reno/Sparks is studying psychology. We could not have had a better reception by the vets and it caused quite stir around the hospital.
Channel 2 (CBS) spent one hour with us. They interviewed me and the queens and followed us. Miss Reno/Sparks has a grandfather who is an inpatient and awaiting airlift to have triple bypass in Palo Alto. After he signed a release, the TV crews filmed the queen and her grandfather. It could not have been a better scripted scene. The TV man was so excited. This is the second time I have done this with him and he and I have an excellent working relationship now.
The Director of the Beauty Pageant, Shirley Lunsford, has invited my husband and me to be her guests at the upcoming Miss Nevada Pageant. She thanked me for asking the girls and I said I felt this was a mutually rewarding relationship. We plan to work together again.
A young vet had arrived home from Afghanistan today and came to the hospital to surprise his mother, who works there. We took a photo of him in uniform with the two queens. He was on cloud nine. I will send him the photo. (EDITOR'S NOTE: See above.)
Gratitude and huge thanks to Andy Barbano. This would not have been such a PR success without him. He was a wonderful and accommodating partner who pressed to make it happen. Thank you Andy!
Our vets were so happy, surprised and appreciative.
No one seemed to know who NARA was but our name is buzzing around the hospital now. The cards were beautiful too. Thanks to Susan Sullivan, a professional artist and art therapy professor.
Update: THURSDAY, 9 FEB. 2012, 2:58 a.m. PST, 10:58 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
VALENTINES FOR VETERANS THIS FRIDAY
RENO, Nev. [MEDIA ADVISORY] — The reigning Miss University of Nevada and Miss Reno/Sparks will join members of the Nevada Alliance for Retired Americans this Friday morning to distribute valentines at Reno's Ioannis A. Lougaris Veterans Medical Center.
Shirley Lunsford, Executive Director of the Miss Reno/Sparks Pageant, will accompany Miss Reno/Sparks Madeline Burak and Miss UNR Ashton Sunsiri.
"The purpose of the event is to show the compassion, appreciation and respect the more than 17,000 members of the Nevada Alliance of Retired Americans have for our veterans on the day our society expresses love," stated NARA Gail Bishop Chapter coordinator Gail Dietrich."We thank them for serving our country. We want them to know just how much we value their sacrifices and cherish them as individuals," Dietrich added.
Beginning at 10:00 a.m. on Friday, Feb. 10, the NARA Valentine Volunteers will gather at the hospital's 975 Kirman Street entrance. They will be escorted inside starting at 10:30. No one may enter unless accompanied by hospital staff.
Valentines were produced by a local artist who wishes to remain anonymous. The visitors will have one for each of the roughly 100 inpatients at the facility.
On Feb. 7, 1941, Betty Joyce Luffman was born in Enid, OK
BREAKING NEWS AND THEN SOME
Forward to the same damned old place
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 2-5-2012 Daily Sparks TribuneBarbano back on statewide Nevada Newsmakers TV/radio program
Corporate welfare brings Reno and Sparks closer to bankruptcy
Updates: SUNDAY, 22 JAN. 2012, 12:01 a.m. PST, 08:01 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
THURSDAY, 19 JAN. 2012, 03:52 a.m. PST, 11:52 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —BARBWIRE AND BALLOT BOXING FROM NEVADALABOR.COM — LIBERALS PICKET BIDEN IN RENO TODAY
RENO, NEV. 1-19-2012 (U-NEWS) — Contrary to popular legend, the hotbed of liberalism in Nevada is not Gomorrah South but the northwest (Reno-Sparks-Washoe County). While voters in these parts occasionally elect an overt racist or good Christian wifebeater, a look at state lawmakers over the past four decades reveals a who's-who of liberalism, including a sprinkling of Republicans.
So it's not at all out of character that liberals from the frozen north will brave the cold today and picket Vice-President Joseph Biden's rally at Galena High School out in the high rent district.
Union members, activists in community organizations and Occupadistas will demonstrate outside Biden's event beginning at 10:30 a.m. PST.
Some signs suggested for diehards who have been encouraged to make their own:We Demand a Fair Settlement
Protect NV Homeowners
Stop Foreclosures
We are the 99%
Downsize This! (Apologies to Michael Moore)For more information, contact the awesome Julie Wedge at (775) 750-7345.
BLAST FROM THE PAST: A PROUD LABOR MAN ADDRESSES NEVADA LABOR — Sen. Joe Biden, D-Del., addresses the Nevada State AFL-CIO convention at the Grand Sierra Resort in Reno on August 21, 2007. A fiery journey down glory road
Joe Biden and the Grateful Dead
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 1-22-2012 Daily Sparks TribuneSen. Obama, meet Mr. Durocher
Barbwire / Sparks Tribune / 8-31-2008A record number of Americans — 150,000,000 — now live at or below the poverty line. That's half the freakin' population of the rusty formerly shining city on the hill. This rich land now sends millions of its children to bed hungry every night. (Yeah, we know, Newt — they should all go and get janitorial jobs like your buds in China.)
If we, the great unwashed, fail to wise up and rise up, corporately schmoozed Democrats will increasingly take us for granted and treat the entire bottom half as though we are all black or brown. (Minorities have gotten used to such treatment, which is not to say they cotton to it.)
On the dimly lit bright side, perhaps it's actually healthy that the former middle class is now sitting with the ghost of Rosa Parks in the back of the bus. (Here on the High Desert Plantation, that includes most of us except teachers and public employees who were thrown under the bus last year with a little help from our friends.)
As Bob Dylan might ask of formerly upward-mobile American dreamers, how does it feel?
If you feel like the legendary Fannie Lou Hamer who was famously "sick and tired of being sick and tired," journey across the railroad trench and tracks to play a little bump and run with the veep today.
Getting our political and governmental dinosaurs off their big, fat sofas is a difficult task at best.
Stand with the occupiers before the man comes to occupy your house.SUPPORT THE NEVADA CITIZEN TV PROJECT, a new channel and network for the many voices of activists, artists and magnificent misfits in a non-corporate environment. For more info or to ante into the game, go to ReSurge.TV. (U-News postal service mailing address, below.)
If the kids can occupy Wall Street, we can occupy our fair share of the public TV spectrum.
Unlike the original structure, there is no public money available to operate this new entity. The deal the former community station's founding board of directors made with the City of Reno in 1991 was that half of cable company franchise fees would be reserved for public access. That would have been $1 million in 2011 from Reno alone. (The original intent of the enabling federal legislation called for all franchise fees to be devoted to public, governmental and educational programming. Apparently, today we don't need no education.)
Over the years, a series of inept managers and hostile public officials in Reno, Sparks and Washoe starved the community station to death.
Bring the Phoenix back from the ashes in time to fire up the populace.
Please donate what you can afford. To those who have already become founding supporters, thank you so much and please spread the word.
You may contribute online at ReSurge.TV.
Stay warm and bring the heat.
Be well. Raise hell.Andrew Barbano
U-News
P.O. Box 10034
Reno, NV 89510
ReSurge.TV.
Checks or money orders payable to U-News may be mailed to the above address.
MARK YOUR CALENDAR: CÉSAR CHÁVEZ DAY / EL DÍA DE CÉSAR CHÁVEZ at Circus Circus-Reno on Saturday, 3-31-2012, César Chávez's 85th birthday. We enjoyed a great turnout from legislators and other public officials, Nevada businesses, non-profits and union members last year. Contact me to reserve tables and sponsorships now. Details at CesarChavezNevada.com.
I'VE SHOWN YOU MINE, NOW SHOW ME YOURS. You may have already seen my list of the most powerful Nevadans.
Send me your suggestions and I'll publish them. Thanks to those who have already responded.
OUR SPIES REPORT: Reno's Atlantis Hotel will break ground on a long-anticipated high rise and a separate parking garage later this year...About 500 attended last Friday's memorial service for Washoe Dist. Judge Bob Perry, one helluva man. Rumor has it that several of his former colleagues will retire early in the coming months. [From the 15 Jan. 2012 Barbwire in the Daily Sparks Tribune. Subscribe or remain out of the loop.]Check out the Barbwire MLK weekend columns from the Sparks Tribune, Reno Gazette-Journal and Fresno Bee.
And stay tuned.Be well. Raise hell.
CesarChavezNevada.com
DoctorLawyerWatch.com
NevadaLabor.com
BallotBoxing.US
Barbwire.TV
REMEMBERING MY DAUGHTERS. On Jan. 16, 1959, two babies were born. They became sisters in both life and death.
Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., 1929-1968Newly uploaded blast from the past for MLK Day —
I was a teenage racist
Barbwire by Andrew Barbano / Expanded from the 1-12-1990 Daily Sparks Tribune
This column also appeared in the 1-19-1990 Comstock Chronicle
Updated and modified versions in the Fresno Bee, Daily Sparks Tribune and
Reno Gazette-Journal Jan. 14-15, 2012
To get the full picture, I suggest reading all of them, as each contains new and different information.
Reader comments (positive and negative) will be uploaded soon.
Please send yours.Update: SUNDAY, 15 JAN. 2012, 00:01:11 a.m. PST, 08:01:11 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT — On this date in 1844, the University of Notre Dame du Lac in Indiana was chartered; in 1896, U.S. Representative Francis Newlands of Nevada was appointed to a commission to establish the boundary line between Canada and the U.S. and also a committee to inquire into the imprisonment of U.S. Consul to Madagascar John Waller (France conquered Madagascar that year and sentenced Waller to twenty years in prison on grounds that he gave military information to the patriot government to try to prevent the French conquest); in 1920, Republican national chair Will Hays (later Hollywood morals cop) spoke in Reno; in 1929, Michael King was born in Atlanta (when he was five years old his father would change both their names to honor Martin Luther); in 1936, former Clark County deputy district attorney T.J.D. Salter was named president of the Winnemucca Townsend Club (Townsend Clubs were chapters of the EPIC movement [End Poverty In California] that had gone national); in 1943, former U.S. district judge William Hastie resigned as Secretary of War Stimson's civilian aide to protest the government's continuing racial policies of segregation and discrimination in the armed forces; in 1951, Ilse Koch, wife of the commandant of the Buchenwald concentration camp, was sentenced to life in prison for her sadistic treatment of camp inmates and for her collection of gloves, lampshades and other items made from inmates killed at her order for their tattoo-decorated skin; in 1962, the North Las Vegas city council voted to ask U.S. Post Office officials to expand the city's service to the entire township so that outlying patrons would not have to drive into town to pick up packages; in 1978, tyrant Reza Pahlavi fled Iran an hour ahead of the posse; in 1996, Tommy Rettig, "Jeff Miller" in the first Lassie television series, an actor in numerous movies and later a computer software engineer, died in Marina del Rey (in 1990, Rettig wrote one of the episodes of The New Lassie, about Lassie learning to use a computer); in 2005, during a morning news program on KTNV TV-13 in Las Vegas, weather reporter Rob Blair referred to "Martin Luther Coon King" and (in an apology for the first reference) "Martin Luther Kong, Jr.", prompting a workforce threat of a walkout (Blair was fired the next day).
About 500 attended the Jan. 13, 2012, memorial service for Washoe District Judge Bob Perry
at the University of Nevada-Reno Crowley Student Union. Several of his former colleagues will retire early. (Barbwire / Daily Sparks Tribune 1-15-2012)Barbano: Flurry of phony corporate conservative petitions blatant attempt to confuse voters
Mixed Mayan mammary metaphors:
By Ed Vogel/ Las Vegas Review-Journal / 13 Jan. 2012
Going belly up and upside down
Barbano by Barbano / Expanded from the 1-8-2012 Daily Sparks TribuneFormer Teamsters Local 533 business agent Don Bouma dies
The awful truth hurts so good
Barbano by Barbano / Expanded from the 1-1-2012 Daily Sparks TribuneCity of Reno solicits job applications, especially for police officers, thru 1-27-2012
The great ones died but Newt's like Dracula
Happy High Holly Days anyway!
Barbano by Barbano / Expanded from the 12-25-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneWashoe County worker morale plunges amid union-bashing
Poor county commission decisions cause destruction of staff levels, services
Incline Village litigation, Pioneer Inn purchase and Ballardini Ranch settlement singled out
By Dennis Myers / Reno News & Review / 12-22-2011Update: TUESDAY, 20 DEC. 2011, 3:16 a.m. PST, 11:16 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
THE NEW UNIONS FIGHT BACK organization will meet at 5:30 p.m. on Tuesday, Dec. 20, at the Plumbers & Pipefitters Local 350 training center, 1150 Greg Street at Industrial in Sparks. Occupy Carson City will send representatives. Washoe County Commissioner Kitty Jung will also address the assembled multitudes. Pizza will be provided, but no beer, alas, even though I asked nicely. (You can tell they jump when I holler.)
All union members are welcome.
For more info, contact 2010 César Chávez Nevada Labor Organizer of the Year Liz Sorenson at CWA 9413/AFL-CIO, 775-322-9413.
(Originally uploaded in U-News e-bulletins 12-8 and 12-12-2011.)Pipeline pigs, oily vultures and flying swine
Barbano by Barbano / Expanded from the 12-18-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneLOBBY YOUR CONGRESSCRITTER TO CONTINUE UNEMPLOYMENT BENEFITS. The fastest way to get money into the economy is to help the unemployed who will spend the small allowance immediately. Go to: http://act.aflcio.org/c/18/p/dia/action3/common/public/?action_KEY=3197
The guns of December pointed at you
Barbano by Barbano / Expanded from the 12-11-2011 Daily Sparks Tribune
7 December yo'11
Pearl Harbor + 70
Please keep in mind that the mistakes of 1941 and more
were present 60 years later on 9-11-2011.
When will we ever learn?
Life imitates art imitates Chuck
Chuck Fisher, 1944-2011
HOT AUGUST STRIKE AT HOT AUGUST NIGHTS — Nevada United Plant Guard Workers of America Local 1010 members in the heat in front of the Reno Hilton during the 1996 Hot August Strike during the Hot August Nights rock'n'rods nostalgiafest, the region's largest special event. Left to right are Jack Stratton, Jay Vanderpool, Al Corral and Chuck Fisher. The outdoor arena where The Beach Boys appeared can be seen in the right background. Although they are members of three unions, The Beach Boys crossed the picket line and performed. [To read the inspiring story of the little union that could, click here.]Nevada may decide 2012 presidency / New community fm radio station
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 12-4-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneDON'T LET 'EM LICK YOUR STAMPS! Postal workers picket and handbill all day 11-30 and 12-1 at Reno main on Vassar Street to solicit public support to save almost 200 area jobs. Public meeting at 6:00 p.m. PST, 1 Dec. 2011 at Wooster High School on E. Plumb Lane in Reno. For info, contact Clancy McCarthy at 775-250-8348.
Sign the petition to the U.S. Senate
FED UP AT THE FEDERAL BUILDING (9-27-2011) — More than 200 postal workers and members of other unions demonstrate at the Bruce Thompson Federal Building in Reno in favor of passage of HR 1351, which would remove the funding drain now threatening the United States Postal Service. The federal courthouse may be seen in the window reflections of the auto in the foreground. (NevadaLabor.com photo) Occupy Caesars Palace?
The local Occupy movement could learn from the welfare moms who stormed the Strip 40 years ago
LV CityLife / 12-1-2011NVEnergy deserves rate cut, not hike
Hugh Jackson / LV CityLife / 12-1-2011Organized labor needs to hire George Clooney
David Macary / Counterpunch / 11-30-2011The Christmas conundrum, harrumph-a-pump-pump
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 11-27-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneEconomist: This is a true depression
Elliott Parker Guest Editorial / LV Sun / 11-27-2011Why African-Americans aren't embracing Occupy Wall Street
Stacy Patton / Opinion / Washington Post / 11-25-2011AFL-CIO urges unions to treat Occupy DC as a picket line
WashingtonPost.com / 11-21-2011The plight of the paper pushers
The great recession made bashing public workers a national sport
Dennis Myers / Reno News & Review / 11-23-2011Bury the Bad News with Rose-colored Reporting
How urgent can economic troubles be if leaders say things are getting better?
Dennis Myers / Reno News & Review / 11-23-2011Update: MONDAY, 21 NOV. 2011, 8:19:30 a.m. PST, 16:19:30 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
FROM: Lisa Stiller (775) 232-2823
Barb Scott, (775) 784-1945
Tell the Super Committee NO cuts to Social Programs!
What: No cuts to social programs!
When: Monday, Nov. 21, 5:30 p.m. PST
Where: Thompson Federal Bldg., 400 S. Virginia at Liberty Street, Reno, Nevada, USA
Who: This event is being put on by concerned citizens of the Reno/Sparks area
The Super Committee comes out with its deficit reduction budget on Wed., Nov. 23. Reno residents will gather at the Federal Building at 5:30 on Monday, Nov. 21, to say no to cuts in social programs: Medicare, Social Security, Medicaid, and other programs such as nutrition, housing, and employment.If the committee fails to come up with a budget plan cutting $1.2 trillion, automatic cuts in social programs could be made. Nevada has the highest unemployment rate in the nation, the highest foreclosure rate and the most barebones Medicaid program. We cannot afford to cut any social programs.
Please help us publicize this. Thanks.
Grading Nevada lawmakers and governor
Progressive Leadership Alliance publishes 2011 Racial Equity Report Card
Las Vegas Sun / 11-21-2011Nevada's 11 most powerful in 2011
Send in your personal picks to click
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 11-20-2011 Daily Sparks Tribune
Update: WEDNESDAY, 16 NOV. 2011, 2:31 p.m. PST, 22:31 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
TAKING IT TO THE STREETS AND AIRWAVES
Reno, Nev., USA —
THE AIR CAMPAIGN: Support the Reno-Sparks-Washoe community TV project, a new home for the many voices of activists, artists and magnificent misfits in a non-corporate environment. To contribute or for more info, go to ReSurge.TV. Postal service mailing address, below.
THE GROUND CAMPAIGN. Join the national march for jobs tomorrow (Nov. 17) in downtown Reno and in communities nationwide. Bring your own sign and bundle up.
"Congress must act now to create millions of good jobs, prevent layoffs and preserve unemployment insurance for jobless workers – and together we must hold every elected official accountable," says Nevada State AFL-CIO Executive Secretary-Treasurer Danny Thompson.
"America wants to work and there is plenty of work to be done–especially when it comes to America’s infrastructure -- roads, bridges, healthcare facilities, and aging schools. That’s why working families nationwide are calling on lawmakers to pass jobs legislation and invest in infrastructure projects that will keep communities safe and create good jobs. Join us and tell Congress that America wants to work."
Northern Nevada: Good Jobs and Safe Bridges NOW!
When: 10:00 a.m. Thursday, 17 Nov. 2011
Where: Virginia Street Bridge
(Meet at 9:45 a.m. on the Ice Rink Plaza at the Mapes graveyard in front of the Black Tower aka Reno City Hall.)
The ancient Virginia St. Bridge is at the center of local flood control plans. The Truckee River Flood Project Board, comprised of Reno-Sparks-Washoe elected officials, meets at 12 Noon on Nov. 17 at the Airport Plaza Hotel across Terminal Way from the Reno airport. Infrastructure advocates are urged to address the board under public comment.
Southern Nevada: Accountability Rally
When:12:30 p.m. Thursday, 17 Nov. 2011
Where: Lloyd George Federal Building
333 Las Vegas Blvd South, Las Vegas, NV
Click here to find other demonstrations nearer to you.OCCUPADISTA GUERRILLAS ARE URGED TO ATTEND ON THURSDAY. Occupy Carson City will hold its next rally in front of the legislative and state capitol buildings from 12 Noon to 3:00 p.m. this Saturday, Nov. 19. Everyone is welcome.
SAY A FOND HELLO. Former Assemblymember Vivian Freeman, D-Reno, is back home and recovering nicely from complications after a kidney transplant. Friends may call her at 775-827-0149.
SAY A FOND GOODBYE. Trumpeter, band leader and union man Al Shay passed away on Nov. 10 at the age of 90. He is survived by his wife, Beth, former president of American Federation of Musicians Local 368/AFL-CIO. No memorial service is planned. You may post a remembrance via the link to his family obituary, hereinbelow.ORGANIZING THE WORKPLACE — Teamsters Local 533 has launched a new website. Members are urged to sign in at Teamsters533.org/
RAISE MONEY FOR YOUR ORGANIZATION. Teamsters 533 and the Reno-Sparks NAACP are among many organizations participating in the SaveMart SHARES program. Members get plastic cards to present when making grocery purchases. SaveMart rebates three percent of the total to the organization. For details, e-mail the editor. (UFCW 711 represents SaveMart workers.)UNIONS FIGHT BACK — Union members should ask their shop stewards about the next UFB meeting in Sparks on Nov. 29. Get ready to rumble.
Be well. Raise hell.
Andrew Barbano
U-News
P.O. Box 10034
Reno, NV 89510
ReSurge.TV
Checks or money orders payable to U-News may be mailed to the above address.
Update: SUNDAY, 13 NOV. 2011, 5:26 a.m. PST, 13:26 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —Trumpeter, band leader, union man Al Shay dies at 90
He is survived by his wife, Beth, former president of American Federation of Musicians Local 368/AFL-CIO.
A standing-room-only crowd listens to César Chávez at the Reno Musicians Union Building on July 15, 1986 (Al Shay's birthday). Mustachioed Al Shay may be seen in a white shirt seated at the center-right of this photo. Beth Shay was president of the local at the time and delivered a welcoming address. Click here for more about that day.
(Photo courtesy of Beth and Al Shay)
Irony cards, cat houses and catty censorship
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 11-13-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneHeroes are made, not born
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 11-6-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneMSHA: Newmont contractor dies of fumes from tire repair
Elko Daily Free Press / 11-1-2011Date: Mon, 31 Oct 2011 00:08:53 PDT, 07:08:53 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT — On this date in 1864 in the high point of his presidency, President Lincoln ratified Nevada's admission to the union (previously approved by Congress), which is now observed around the world by costumed children going door to door for candy; in 1911, John W. O'Banion of Wellington and James Nichol of Yerington were granted a patent for their hay raking and bunching machine; in 1933, as repeal of prohibition neared, U.S. District Court Judge Frank Norcross issued a report claiming that Nevada had the nation's best record of enforcing alcohol prohibition (among the corruption convictions achieved in Nevada was one against state prohibition director Ned Green in1926); in 1956, two days after Israel launched an unprovoked attack on Egypt, Britain and France — over the objection of the U.S. — joined the attack (the Eisenhower administration said it stood by its 1950 declaration pledging assistance to any Middle East victim of aggression, but it failed to come to Egypt's aid); in 1965, The New York Times published a story on a peculiar slice of the dark underside of life — a profile of Daniel Burros, a Jewish Nazi and Klansman who killed himself the day the story appeared; in 2000, Russia offered intercontinental ballistic missiles for sale.
Ostrich heads in the sands of Sparks Marina
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 10-30-2011 Daily Sparks Tribune
UPDATED Tuesday, 25 Oct. 2011, 08:21:34 PDT, 15:21:34 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
St. Crispin's Day
From The Chronicle Historye of Henrye the
Fifth with his battell fought at Agincourt
in France. Together with Auntient Pistolle.
by William ShakespeareThis day is call'd the feast of Crispin.
He that outlives this day, and comes safe home,
Will stand a tip-toe when this day is nam'd,
And rouse him at the name of Crispin.
He that shall live this day, and see old age,
Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours,
And say To-morrow is Saint Crispin.‚
Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars,
And say These wounds I had on Crispin's day.
Old men forget; yet all shall be forgot,
But he'll remember, with advantages,
What feats he did that day. Then shall our names,
Familiar in his mouth as household words
Harry the King, Bedford and Exeter,
Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester
Be in their flowing cups freshly rememb'red.
This story shall the good man teach his son;
And Crispin Crispian shall ne'er go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remembered
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition;
And gentlemen in England now-a-bed
Shall think themselves accurs'd they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day.
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.
HAT TRICK
Barbwire wins third straight Nevada Press Association first-place award
The 2009 first-place Nevada Press Association award winners
Tony the Tiger & the flaky NFL
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Deregulation is never having to say you're sorry
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Nevada: A good place to visit, but do you want to live here?
Barbwire / 6-15-2008
The price of a piece/6-17-2007
Boxing Pandora/9-23-2007
The Lady in the Red Dress
10-28-2007Barbwire.TV
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from the 2009 and 2011 legislative sessions(775) 882-8255
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Daily Sparks Tribune 2-10-2008The Barbwire's Greatest Hits
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mp3 fileOn October 25 1880, the day before O.K. Corral, the Reno Evening Gazette ran a story on the rising Arizona boomtown of Tombstone and reported that two former Reno businesspeople were operating there; in 1909, the City of Reno, which owned a single share in the Orr Ditch Company, owed an assessment of fifteen cents on its share; in 1918, the October 5 combat death of third baseman Eddie Grant, who had played for the Cleveland Indians (1905), Philadelphia Phillies (1907-1910), Cincinnati Reds (1911-1913), and New York Giants (1913-1915) was announced; the Paris Stars and Stripes headline reading BASEBALL LOSES BIG LEAGUE STAR IN GREATER GAME (Grant was drafted deferred because of his age of 33 but volunteered for Army service anyway, and was killed by a German shell while leading his unit to an attempted rescue of the Lost Battalion, a force of about 500 Allied soldiers trapped by German forces in the Argonne forest); in 1937, former first lady Lou Hoover was the guest at a tea at the home of Mrs. Tasker Oddie and several other social functions in Reno; in 1950, Jimmy Dodd, who appeared as a Reno cab driver in the Judy Holiday/Jack Lemmon movie Phfft! and later became famous as one of the adult Mousketeers, was appearing in the theatre bar of the Golden Hotel in Reno; in 1954, the Comics Code Authority, a McCarthy-era entity, was established to screen comic books for violence, gore, sex and other politically incorrect content such as African-American characters and tobacco advertising (Archie Comics and DC Comics were the last publishers to honor the CCA and both dropped it in January 2011); in 1961, Las Vegas Hacienda Hotel president Warren Baxley purchased 25 Constellation airliners from Trans World Airlines, the largest known purchase of airliners by a private citizen; in 1962, U.S. Ambassador Adlai Stevenson presented photographic evidence of the presence of nuclear missiles in Cuba, but failed to produce any evidence of their illegality under international law; in 1985, according to the Back to the Future canon, Marty McFly traveled back in time to 1955 in a DeLorean DMC-12; in 2002, U.S. Senator Paul Wellstone, D-Minnesota, was killed in a plane crash; in 2011, the Reno Philharmonic will perform the Flying Dutchman, Grieg's Piano Concerto in A minor, and Beethoven's Fifth Symphony.
Corporate welfare watch
Local sporting goods stores drop like flies while corporate welfare queens Cabela's and Scheels score tax dollars based on a bright, shining lie. Heavily subsidized Reno Aces billionaire boss says he's open to higher taxes but refuses to pay in Nevada.
ALSO: KOCH CAIN — Koch Bros. would rather invest in follyticians like PizzamanThe dog ate my press release
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 10-23-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneLoss of Faith
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 10-16-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneDirty words and sexy talk always get it on
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 10-9-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneWhen money owns you
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 10-2-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneUPDATED Saturday, 1 Oct. 2011, 12:10:16 PDT, 07:10:16 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
On this date in 1890, Congress created Yosemite National Park; in 1915, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that Thomas Edison's Motion Picture Patents Company, which used gangs of thugs to break up the equipment and productions of competitors and gave many companies reason to leave the moviemaking center of New York for southern California, was an illegal trust; in 1931, the Las Vegas Review-Journal had an "electric score board" in front of its building on which Las Vegans could "watch" the action in the world series between the St. Louis Cardinals and Philadelphia Athletics; in 1938, actress, director, producer, model and Golden Globe award winner Stella Stevens was born Estelle Caro Eggleston in Yazoo City, Mississippi; in 1944, awful "medical" experiments on gay men began at Buchenwald slave labor camp outside Weimar, Germany; in 1957, Sea Wife starring Joan Collins and Richard Burton ended its run at the Crest Theatre in Reno; in 1961 with a swing that was a thing of beauty, Roger Maris hit his 61st home run of the season, breaking the season home run record and ending his ordeal at the hands of the press and resentful fans of Babe Ruth (the record stood for 37 years — longer than Ruth held it — until September 8, 1998, when Mark McGwire broke it while Maris' widow and his children watched from the stands at McGwire's personal invitation); in 1964, the arrest of Jack Weinberg for setting up a table with civil rights literature and the shutdown of a free speech area in Sproul Plaza by administrators at the University of California at Berkeley launched the Free Speech Movement (a couple of thousand students surrounded the police car containing Weinberg and held it for more than thirty hours); in 1971, the Federal Aviation Administration opened an investigation of pilot Darryl Greenamyer for buzzing the spectator bleachers at the Reno Air Races, which had fined him for the action; in 2001, with U.S. media outlets in war fever in the wake of September 11, there was one major instance of emphasizing peace — a program of John Lennon music at Radio City Music Hall that was carried live on U.S. television.Wednesday, 28 Sep 2011 10:29 a.m. PDT / 17:29 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
UPDATED Thursday, 29 Sep 2011 12:54 p.m. PDT / 19:54 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
Culinary Union leader Jim Arnold, Jr., died on Wednesday, Sept. 28, 2011
All of Nevada labor mourns
LABOR LEGENDS — Jim Arnold, Jr., in blue jacket and sunglasses, marching for workers' rights with César Chávez back in the day.
Services for Jim Arnold announced
LAS VEGAS, Nev. USA (UNews) 9-29-2011 — Services for Jim Arnold, Jr., will be held at 10:00 a.m. Monday, October 3, at the King David Memorial Chapel, 2697 E. Eldorado Lane, Las Vegas, NV 89120. Burial will follow at Palm Memorial Park.
The King David Chapel is on the Palm Memorial Park premises. To get to there, turn off Eastern onto Eldorado Lane which runs parallel to the entrance to Palm Mortuary at 7600 S. Eastern, Las Vegas. The phone number for the King David Chapel is (702) 464-8570.In lieu of flowers, donations in Jim’s memory can be made to Hollingsworth Elementary School (contact United Way at 702.892.2554) or the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society.
SEEDING THE FUTURE (7-12-1995) — Plasterers and Cement Masons Business Manager Bob Curtis, second from left, and Nevada State AFL-CIO Executive Secretary-Treasurer Claude S. "Blackie" Evans, second from right, present a $2,000 AFL-CIO/Jim Arnold, Sr., Scholarship check to the parents of Giselle Zagari (Reed High School '95), who went on to medical school at the University of Nevada-Reno. John Zagari is a longtime member of Plasterers & Cement Masons Local 241 / AFL-CIO. The award was presented at a Northern Nevada Central Labor Council meeting on July 12, 1995. Marie Zagari stands at right. Dr. Giselle Zagari graduated from the UNR med school. Thank you.
Danny L. Thompson
Executive Secretary-Treasurer
Nevada State AFL-CIO
LAS VEGAS, Nev. USA (UNews) 9-28-2011 — The man who saved the largest labor union in Nevada passed away on Wednesday, Sept. 28, at the age of 68.
All of Nevada labor mourns Jim Arnold, Jr.By the time he retired, Jim Arnold, Jr., led the largest union in Nevada history.
It could have easily gone the other way. When he won the leadership position in 1987, the union's membership was down and Las Vegas casino overlords smelled blood in the water.
Arnold brought the union back from the brink and successfully led the workers on strike, including the longest walkout in U.S. history against the New Frontier Hotel which lasted six and one-half years. The hotel was eventually sold and new owner Phil Ruffin signed a union contract.Under Arnold, Jr., the union returned to its place as a major force for Nevada workers and in Nevada politics.
His father was a longtime union man. Jim Arnold, Sr., served as head of the Building & Construction Council of Southern Nevada/AFL-CIO and the Southern Nevada Central Labor Council/AFL-CIO.
In his father's honor, Arnold, Jr., endowed the Nevada State AFL-CIO Jim Arnold, Sr., Scholarship (now the Arnold-Jones-Evans Scholarship program), which has helped pay for the university educations of hundreds of children of union households.
Culinary Local 226 is now Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees Local 226. It had 23,000 members when Jim Arnold., Jr., was first elected in 1987, grew to more than 55,000 members before Sept. 11, 2001, and stands at 60,000 members today. Most southern Nevada resort hotels are unionized, as well as Circus Circus and the Grand Sierra Resort in Reno.
Watch NevadaLabor.com for updates.
DON'T LET 'EM LICK YOUR STAMPS! On Sept. 27, postal workers and a few million of their best friends march in Nevada and nationwide to save the U.S. Postal Service from degradation and privatization. BE THERE.
Postal workers rally to save Reno distribution center
Reno Gazette-Journal 9-28-2011EEOC pushes probe of LV Venetian Hotel age discrimination
Las Vegas Sun / 9-26-2011Dirty books, holy men, false prophets and sex profits
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 9-25-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneBarbano back on statewide Nevada Newsmakers TV/radio program
Corporate bake sales for broken governments
Unions threatened in attempt to stifle Obama administration criticism
Democrats schedule national convention with rat labor
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 9-18-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneSo what else is new? Republican Amodei smokes titular Democrat for 30-year GOP Nevada House seat. Portents below.
"There was no reason for the base to come out (for Kate Marshall). I was very disappointed in her campaign."
Nevada Newsmakers / 9-14-2011Piss up a rope: Vote
NY, NV special House elections all about bragging rights / Laborers' Union files legal actions over illegal bids
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 9-11-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneLabor Day now a disaster
Jake Highton / Daily Sparks Tribune / 9-11-2011Economic creationism just as practical as the other kind
Hugh Jackson / LV CityLife / 9-8-2011The Use of 9/11 to Consolidate Conservative Power: Intimidation via Framing
George Lakoff / Nation of Change / 9-11-2011
Wednesday, 7 Sep 2011 13:36:20 PDT / 20:36:20ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT — State Sen. Ruben Kihuen, D-Las Vegas, brings his new congressional campaign to northern Nevada:Luncheon honoring Nevada State Sen. Ruben Kihuen, Democratic Candidate for United States Congress
Friday, Sept. 9, 2011, 12 Noon – 1 p.m.
Panaderia San Francisco [] 1597 Vassar St. [] Reno, Nevada [] 775-333-9021
$25 Suggested minimum contribution
Please make checks payable to Committee to Elect Ruben Kihuen
For more information or to RSVP, please contact Megan Jones
Or donate online at RubenForCongress.com
Contributions or gifts to the Committee to Elect Ruben Kihuen are not tax deductible.Tuesday, 30 Aug. 2011, 07:32:01 PDT, 14:32:01 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
New York Journal of Commerce / August 30, 1839: On board the brig we also saw Cinques, the master spirit and hero of this bloody tragedy [the mutiny and subsequent trial and conviction of the slaves on board La Amistad), in irons. He is about five feet eight inches in height, 25 or 26 years of age, of erect figure, well built, and very active. He is said to be a match for any two men on board the schooner. His countenance, for a native African, is unusually intelligent, evincing uncommon decision and coolness, with a composure characteristic of true courage, and nothing to mark him as a malicious man. He is a negro who would command in New Orleans, under the hammer, at least $1500.
He is said, however, to have killed the captain and crew with his own hand, by cutting their throats. He also has several times attempted to take the life of Senor Montes, and the backs of several poor negroes are scored with the scars of blows inflicted by his lash to keep them in subjection. He expects to be executed, but nevertheless manifests a sang froid worthy of a Stoic under similar circumstances.On this date in 1864, a telegram to President Lincoln was received at the War Department in D.C., six days after it was sent from Sacramento: "The worst State of things Exist in Nevada The Judges wanting public confidence have been compelled to resign suspend action until you hear from us by letter [signed:] John Conness F[rederick].F. Low"; in 1902, Patrick McCarran announced his candidacy for the Nevada Assembly; in 1936, a new Geiger Grade highway to Virginia City was opened to traffic; in 1939, Overton superintendent of schools Paul Thurston said new school buildings in Moapa would be ready by the start of the school year on September 6; in 1944, the Hairdressers and Cosmetologists Local Union No. 1024-A published a notice announcing that beauty shops in Las Vegas would henceforth be open only on weekdays from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m.; in 1965, Bob Dylan's album Highway 61 Revisited was released by Columbia; in 1970 "elections" were held in areas "controlled" by "South Vietnam"; in 1972, John and Yoko staged two concerts in Madison Square Garden that also featured Roberta Flack and Stevie Wonder and raised $1,500,000 for Willowbrook, an institution for mentally disabled children; in 2004, the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights reported that health care among Native Americans (in the U.S.) had fallen to third world levels.
If you can't win, be spectacular
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 8-28-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneMiners don't even kiss us afterward
Hugh Jackson / Las Vegas CityLife / 8-25-2011Pro sports players need their unions
Jake Highton / Daily Sparks Tribune / 8-21-2011Suicide via Laborcide in Carolina
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 8-21-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneBullshots and bum watches
Will Nevada unions picket their own convention?
Culinary 226 cuts new deal in the face of Grand Sierra Reno's wholesale outsourcing
Huge Tonopah solar array project is Nevada's newest corporate welfare queen
Residents opposing Comstock pit mine schedule events
Seniors group endorses Democrat Kate Marshall in 9-13-2011 Nevada special election
Verizon national strike comes to Nevada
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 8-14-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneBullfighting in Tonopah, Part Deux
Latest survival bulletins from the High Desert Outback of the American Dream
Wherein the D.A. comes apart like a cheap watch
Barbwire by Barbano special web edition 8-11-2011
Substantially updated and expanded from the 8-7-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneBullfighting in Tonopah
All the news you never knew you needed to know 'til now
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 8-7-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneOn this date in 1606 according to dubious folklore, child actor Hal Berridge became feverish and died while playing Lady Macbeth in the play's first performance, starting the theatre curse of Macbeth; in 1844, explorer John Fremont arrived in St. Louis after a long trip during which he left his imprint on the west by naming everything he encountered, including Pyramid Lake, Carson Valley, and the Great Basin itself (his name of Bonpland for Lake Tahoe, after a French botanist, did not stick); in 1902, two-time Nevada League of Women Voters president Esther Nicholson was born in Allegan County, Michigan; in 1918, U.S. European commander John Pershing issued a document titled Secret Information Concerning Black-American Troops that warned French officials (many African Americans were fighting as French soldiers because they were unwelcome in the U.S. forces) of the "menace of degeneracy which had to be prevented by the gulf established between the two races ... because of the fact that they were given to the loathsome vice of criminally assaulting women" (the French ignored the advice but did suggest to their officers that they not praise the blacks too highly in the presence of white U.S. soldiers to avoid inflaming them); in 1930, Thomas Shipp and Abram Smith were lynched in Marion, Indiana, a photograph of their bodies hanging from a tree later inspiring Bronx schoolteacher Abel Meeropol to write the famed anthem Strange Fruit (in 2000 a group of distinguished composers named it the seventh most influential song of the 1900s [Editor's Note: 20th Century]); in 1931, a strike at Boulder Dam, led by the Industrial Workers of the World, began; in 1941, a wage agreement was reached between workers and the William P. Neil Company, which was constructing buildings at the Hawthorne naval ammunition depot; in 1963, union plumbers threw a picket line up at the Nevada atomic testing site against Reynolds Electrical Engineering, the last holdout against a new contract; in 1964, Congress authorized war against Vietnam (Editor's Note: The Gulf of Tonkin Resolution); in 1987, swimmer Lynne Cox swam from the United States to the Soviet Union across the Bering Strait in 2 hours, 16 minutes; in 2006, a web site called Christianet.com generated wide attention by claiming that it had conducted a survey (and hiring a news release distribution firm to publicize its survey) indicating that "50% of all Christian men and 20% of all Christian women are addicted to pornography", though the survey sample was self-selected and therefore invalid and the pollsters used a scientifically dubious definition for the term addicted.
From The New York Times:
Washington, Aug. 7, 1964 — The House of Representatives and the Senate approved today the resolution requested by President Johnson to strengthen his hand in dealing with Communist aggression in Southeast Asia.
After a 40-minute debate, the House passed the resolution; 416 to 0. Shortly afterward the Senate approved it, 88 to 2. Senate debate, which began yesterday afternoon, lasted nine hours.
The resolution gives prior Congressional approval of "all necessary measures" that the President may take "to repel any armed attack" against United States forces and 'to prevent further aggression."
...The debates in both houses, but particularly in the Senate, made clear, however, that the near-unanimous vote did not reflet a unanimity of opiion on the necessity or advisability of the resolution.
Except for Senators Wayne L. Morse, Democrat of Oregon, and Ernest Gruening, Democrat of Alaska, who cast the votes against the resolution, members in both houses uniformly praised the President for the retaliatory action he had ordered against North Vietnamese torpedo boats and their bases after the second torpedo boat attack on United States destroyers in the Gulf of Tonkin.
There was also general agreement that Congress could not reject the President's requested resolution without giving an impression of disunity and nonsupport that did not, in fact, exist.
There was no support for the thesis on which Senators Morse and Gruening based their opposition- that the resolution was "unconstitutional" because it was "a predated declaration of war power" reserved to Congress. Nevertheless, many members said the President did not need the resolution because he had the power as Commander in Chief to order United States forces to repel attacks.
Several members thought the language of the resolution was unnecessarily broad and they were apprehensive that it would be interpreted as giving Congressional support for direct participation by United States troops in the war in South Vietnam.What's the ugliest part of your body?
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 7-31-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneUFW leader Richard Chávez, brother of César Chávez, dies at 81
Los Angeles Times / 7-28-2011
Demonstration at Congressman Joe Heck’s Office
FROM: Danny L. Thompson, Executive Secretary-Treasurer, Nevada State AFL-CIO
Once again politicians are playing games in Washington instead of creating jobs and strengthening our economy! The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) was forced to partially shut down at midnight Friday, July 22, 2011 as Congress adjourned without passing a funding extension. Air control functions will continue, however, 4,000 FAA employees have been laid-off, and nearly 90,000 construction jobs are at risk nationally!
In Nevada alone, over 1,000 airport construction jobs are at risk of being lost due to the FAA shutdown. Don't let Republicans hold our jobs hostage. Nevada already has high unemployment and a struggling economy. Let’s make sure Cong. Joe Heck understands that Nevadans want to work, and we are not going to allow him to score political victories at the expense of working families in Nevada.
Let’s make our voice heard loud and clear. Learn More and Join Us! Make Your VOICE HEARD!
What: Action at Congressman Joe Heck’s Office (CD-3)
When: Thursday, July 28, at 9:00 a.m. PDT
Where: 8485 W. Sunset Road, Suite 300, Las Vegas NV, 89113
If you have any questions, please contact the Nevada AFL-CIO or the Southern Nevada Building and Construction Trades Council at 702-452-8799Lord Rupert's Rupture and President Tiger Wuss
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 7-24-2011 Daily Sparks TribunePresident Kevorkian and Harry Potter's Congress
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 7-17-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneAssemblyman Richard Daly/LIUNA Local 169:
We put the state on life support for another two years
Reno Gazette-Journal Guest Editorial / 7-17-2011Updated on 7-15 yo'11
César Chávez came to Reno 25 years ago today
Obama pays tribute to late Reno labor leader
THE WAY WE WERE — The above is a recently discovered photo from July 15, 1986. Left to right are Kathy Brown, Culinary Union Local 86 office manager; Miguel Contreras, Local 86 Secretary-Treasurer; Local 86 President Bill Uehlein; a lady named Natalie (anyone who knows her last name, please write), and César Chávez. This item was first published in Ahora, northern Nevada's Spanish-English weekly, on March 26, 2008. (On 3-19-2009, President Obama paid tribute to Brother Contreras as he spoke in the L.A. building named after the late labor leader. See the 1986 Chávez Reno archive, below.)
(Photo courtesy of Dan Rusnak, retired business manager of Laborers' Union Local 169.)
More stories and photos from César Chávez's 1986 Reno visitUpdate: Fri., 15 Jul. 2011 00:01:11 PDT, 07:01:11 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
On this date in 1099 after a five week seige, Christians of the first crusade entered Jerusalem and for two days methodically murdered its Jewish and Muslim population, including thousands of Muslims on Temple Mount and Jews in a synagogue who were burned to death (see below); in 1205 in a letter to the archbishop of Sens, Pope Innocent 3d decreed that Jews, as crucifiers of Christ, are doomed to perpetual punishment and labor (Innocent's fourth Lateran council ruled that Jews and Sarazens had to differentiate themselves from the rest of the population by wearing distinguishing clothing marks, a technique later adopted by the Nazis); in 1864 for one dollar, J.D. Pollard leased D.W. Strong's ranch on the west side of Donner Lake with "full interest in property's buildings as originally planned are completed or $2500 expended"; in 1919, the Provost Marshal General in D.C., who administered the draft, was relieved of duty and his office shut down, ending draft activities, and it was announced that 337,000 U.S. men had resisted the draft during the world war; in 1933 in Clark County, the U.S. Forest Service gave its approval for a highway into Charleston Park; in 1947, after six small children in three years drowned, the Reno city council voted for a $100,000 bond to fence ditches that crossed the city, one of them forming the southern border of popular Whitaker Park; in 1970, a bill returning land to the Washoe Tribe in Woodfords received final congressional approval; in 1986, César Chávez spoke to Nevada workers at the Musicians Union hall in Reno; in 1999 after half a century of evasions and denials by the federal government, U.S. Secretary of Energy Bill Richardson acknowledged for the first time that thousands of nuclear weapons contract workers were made sick by exposure to toxic substances and promised to compensate many of them for medical care and lost wages.
Christian chronicler Fulker of Chartres: At the noon hour on Friday, with trumpets sounding, amid great commotion and shouting "God help us," the Franks entered the city. When the pagans saw one standard planted on the wall, they were completely demoralized, and all their former boldness vanished, and they turned to flee through the narrow streets of the city. Those who were already in rapid flight began to flee more rapidly.
Count Raymond and his men, who were attacking the wall on the other side, did not yet know of all this, until they saw the Saracens leap from the wall in front of them. Forthwith, they joyfully rushed into the city to pursue and kill the nefarious enemies, as their comrades were already doing. Some Saracens, Arabs, and Ethiopians took refuge in the tower of David, others fled to the temples of the Lord and of Solomon. A great fight took place in the court and porch of the temples, where they were unable to escape from our gladiators. Many fled to the roof of the temple of Solomon, and were shot with arrows, so that they fell to the ground dead. In this temple almost ten thousand were killed. Indeed, if you had been there you would have seen our feet colored to our ankles with the blood of the slain. But what more shall I relate? None of them were left alive; neither women nor children were spared...
This may seem strange to you. Our squires and poorer footmen discovered a trick of the Saracens, for they learned that they could find byzants [note: a gold coin] in the stomachs and intestines of the dead Saracens, who had swallowed them. Thus, after several days they burned a great heap of dead bodies, that they might more easily get the precious metal from the ashes. Moreover, Tancred broke into the temple of the Lord and most wrongfully stole much gold and silver, also precious stones, but later, repenting of his action, after everything had been accounted for, be restored all to its former place of sanctity.
The carnage over, the crusaders entered the houses and took whatever they found in them. However, this was all done in such a sensible manner that whoever entered a house first received no injury from any one else, whether he was rich or poor. Even though the house was a palace, whatever he found there was his property. Thus many poor men became rich...
O day so ardently desired, desired because in the inner longing of the heart it had always been hoped by all believers in the Catholic faith that the place of the Creator of all creatures, God, made man, in His manifold pity for mankind, had by His birth, death, and resurrection, conferred the gift of redemption, would be restored to its pristine dignity. They desired that this place, so long contaminated by the superstition of the pagan inhabitants, should be cleansed from their contagion.Dr. Strangelove and Sen. Don the Dumberer
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the Daily Sparks Tribune 7-10-2011Update: Thu., 7 Jul. 2011 00:01:44 PDT, 07:01:44 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
Television critic John Crosby/New York Herald Tribune: There have been some dull See It Now shows, and some have been better than others, but it is by every criterion television's most brilliant, most decorated, most imaginative, most courageous and most important program. The fact that CBS cannot afford it but can afford Beat the Clock is shocking.
On this date in 1846, U.S. Navy Commodore John Sloat sailed into Monterey bay and sent his second in command to raise the U.S. flag over the customs house and declare California to be the property of the United States, neglecting to ask the permission of the actual owners, Mexico or the residents (the Sloat "conquest" failed to take and the U.S. had to launch the 1848 war of aggression against Mexico in order to legally steal California); in 1865, four alleged conspirators in the Lincoln assassination, Mary Surratt, Lewis Paine, David Herold and George Atzerodt were hanged at the Washington Arsenal, now a part of Fort McNair (Surratt was the first woman ever executed by the U.S. government); in 1906, U.S. Senator William Clark of Montana, who established Las Vegas as a maintenance stop for his San Pedro, Los Angeles and Salt Lake Railroad (and for whom Clark County is named), was reported to be planning a return to Nevada for the reopening by his brother-in-law of a Beatty hotel; in 1913, Joe Willie Perkins, better known as boogie-woogie bluesman Pinetop Perkins, was born in Belzoni, Mississippi (New York Times: "From his days in the groups of [Muddy] Waters and the slide guitarist Robert Nighthawk to the vigorous solo career he fashioned ... Mr. Perkins' accomplishments were numerous and considerable. ... Few people working in any popular art form have been as prolific in the ninth and tenth decades of their lives."); in 1953, former FBI and congressional investigator William Sinnott was en route from Pennsylvania to Las Vegas where he would take a job as an investigator for Nevada gambling regulators; in 1954, Elvis' voice was heard on the radio for the first time when deejay Dewey Phillips played That's All Right, Mama on WHBQ in Memphis (Elvis was hiding in a movie theatre, and his parents found him there and told him the song had drawn phone calls and was being played over and over on the radio station; the Chicsa Hotel where WHBQ had its studio was later donated to the Church of God in Christ, is in disrepair, and is listed on Memphis' list of ten most endangered buildings; on June 17 last month a slab of concrete fell off the building); in 1958, See It Now, the distinguished news program produced by Edward R. Murrow and Fred Friendly, was taken off the air by CBS chair William Paley; in 1967, All You Need Is Love b/w Baby You're A Rich Man by The Beatles was released in Britain by Parlophone (by Capitol on July 17 in the U.S.); in 1976 at the remaining structure of Wardenclyffe Tower on Long Island, built in 1901 (but never completed) by Nikola Tesla in an unsuccessful effort to prove his theory that electrical energy could be transmitted through the air to Europe, a plaque marking Tesla's 120th birthday was installed (it was later stolen).Nevada Supreme Court upholds Republican plan for party-controlled special house election
A precedent of sorts for the contested one-vote North Las Vegas City Council election
July 4 Railroad Jobs: We're Red, White and Screwed
PLEADING POVERTY: Washoe County Commission tries to up D.A.'s quickie conviction rate
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 7-3-2011 Daily Sparks TribunePoor Denny's Almanac
Subject: Independence Day
Date: Sat, 2 Jul. 2011 02:48:49 PDT / 09:48:49 ZULU/GMT
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.
HAT TRICK 2010:
Barbwire wins third straight Nevada Press Association first-place award
The 2009 first-place Nevada Press Association award winners
Tony the Tiger & the flaky NFL
Barbwire / 11-30-2008
Deregulation is never having to say you're sorry
Barbwire / 8-3-2008
Nevada: A good place to visit, but do you want to live here?
Barbwire / 6-15-2008
The price of a piece/6-17-2007
Boxing Pandora/9-23-2007
The Lady in the Red Dress
10-28-2007Barbwire.TV
Click here for on-demand re-runs
from the 2009 and 2011 legislative sessions(775) 882-8255
[882-TALK]Barbwire.TV:
15-year overnight success
Daily Sparks Tribune 2-10-2008The Barbwire's Greatest Hits
Highlights from radio days
mp3 fileResolution declaring independence/adopted by Congress July 2d 1776: Resolved: That these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States, that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved.
Letter from John Adams to Abigail Adams: Philadelphia, 3 July...But the Day is past. The Second Day of July 1776, will be the most memorable Epocha, in the History of America. I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated, by succeeding Generations, as the great anniversary Festival. It ought to be commemorated, as the Day of Deliverance by solemn Acts of Devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with Pomp and Parade, with Shews, Games, Sports, Guns, Bells, Bonfires and Illuminations from one End of this Continent to the other from this Time forward forever more. You will think me transported with Enthusiasm but I am not. I am well aware of the Toil and Blood and Treasure, that it will cost Us to maintain this Declaration, and support and defend these States. Yet through all the Gloom I can see the Rays of ravishing Light and Glory. I can see that the End is more than worth all the Means. And that Posterity will tryumph in that Days Transaction, even altho We should rue it, which I trust in God We shall not. (Emphasis added.)
[When this letter was revealed years later by Abigail's nephew William Shaw, the nation had already begun celebrating the wrong date, so Shaw altered the text before releasing it, re-dating it July 5 and changing the first line to read "The Fourth Day of July".]
On this date in 1752 the first English Bible published in the colonies was printed in Boston; in 1776 the Continental Congress declared independence from England; in 1881 President Garfield was shot in a railroad station (he lingered on for eleven weeks before dying, the longest period of executive disability until Woodrow Wilson); in 1909 the former Coney Island amusement park site on the Sparks/Reno road was reopened as a tourist court; in 1917 encouraged by the Wilson administration‚s raids against political radicals as well as Woodrow Wilson's own white supremecist policies, vigilantism exploded in East St. Louis as white rioting targeted African Americans (the official count of the dead was 39, but newspaper reports at the time said 200); in 1932 Franklin Roosevelt was nominated for president by the Democratic Party; in 1947 something crashed near Roswell, New Mexico; in 1956 backed for the first time by the Jordanaires, Elvis recorded Don't Be Cruel, Anyway You Want Me, and Hound Dog; in 1962 the town of Tungsten in Nevada, including 90 dwellings and water and telephone companies, was sold to a corporation in Denver who the Nevada State Journal neglected to identify (the same edition reported a near riot by 500 students in Al Tahoe but never explained what the disturbance was about); in 1969 U.S. Senator George McGovern of South Dakota revealed in a Senate speech that on May 23 during a trip to Paris he had met in a secret 10-hour session with Vietnamese and National Liberation Front negotiators and said it had reinforced his view that the United States must begin systematic withdrawal of troops from Vietnam and end its support for the Saigon dictatorship (Nevadan Dennis Myers listened to the speech from the Senate gallery); in 1969 over an Associated Press story on a federal appeals court ruling that gay federal employees cannot be fired solely because of their sexual orientation, the Los Angeles Herald Examiner ran the headline "CAN'T FIRE DEVIATES, U.S. TOLD"; in 1970 Larry Ray Brenner, son of Virginia Brenner of Las Vegas, died in Phuoc Long province, Vietnam (Panel 09W, line 109 of the Vietnam wall); in 1977 the Nevada Supreme Court ruled that the law creating the Clark County Commission (Las Vegas) was unconstitutional and ordered that the seven incumbent commissioners be removed from office and that the governor appoint replacements (Governor Mike O‚Callagahan said he would reappoint the same people who were being removed); in 2003 George Bush invited attacks on the U.S. forces he sent to Iraq: "There are some who feel like that the conditions are such that they can attack us there. My answer is, bring them on. We got the force necessary to deal with the security situation."
UPDATED Tuesday, 28 June 2011, 07:28 p.m. PDT, 02:28 6-29-2011 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
BREAKING NEWS — Railway engineer gives his perspective on the fiery and fatal Trinity, Nevada, tractor-trailer/AMTRAK crash
Shame on NV Energy Asks Board Chair Philip Satre to Release Internal Report on Ensign-Yackira Scandal
IBEW 1245 / 6-28-2011Many occupations now spared onerous work card requirement
Las Vegas Sun / 6-26-2011You can't have your war and eat it, too
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 6-26-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneUPDATED Sunday, 19 June 2011, 10:33 p.m. PDT, 05:33 6-20-2011 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT
and Tuesday, 21 June 2011, 4:29 p.m. PDT / 24:29 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT—BREAKING NEWS
Final pieces found at last!
Conservative economist Pierre A. Rinfret's seminal 1966 commentary on how war spending destroys the economies of nations: Peace is Bullish
Vietnam's Economic Lesson: Peace can yield fatter profits than war / Look Magazine 5-31-1966
Plus: The actual facts behind the fabled JFK tax cuts
Skinned and Barbecued
GOP governor and lawmakers turn Democrats into Jimmy Carter's attack rabbit
Dennis Myers / Reno News & Review / 6-16-2011Workers only got worked over by the "jobs-jobs-jobs" legislature
Dennis Myers / Reno News & Review / 6-9-20112011 Legislative Session Became a War Against Workers
And with the neglect of media stenographers, the workers lost —> badly
Reno News & Review Editorial / 6-9-2011
More MyersNevada government's license to kill
A funeral dirge for the disposable worker
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 6-5-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneHall of famers give the boss the finger
Ronnie Lott and Sylvester Kelley — Toughest of the tough guys
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 6-19-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneUPDATED Friday, 17 June 2011, 07:19:41 a.m. PDT, 14:19:41 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
SYLVESTER KELLEY, GUTSY RETIREE & WW2 VET WHO BATTLED NV ENERGY OVER MEDICAL BENEFITS DIES
Memorial service on Saturday, June 18 and Monday, June 20
CARSON CITY, Nev. (IBEW 1245) — Sylvester Kelley, who played a leading role in the fight to preserve retiree medical benefits at NV Energy, died on Monday, June 13. He was 87.
Kelley was a decorated World War II veteran who devoted his working life to Sierra Pacific Power and after retirement fought the company to defend medical benefits for all retirees.
A celebration of his life will be held on Saturday, June 18 at 4:30 p.m. at the Little Baptist Church in Silver Springs, Nev. The church is across from the Village Market off Highway 95A in the small shopping center the church is using until construction is completed on a new building.There will be a reception after the service at the Kelley residence.
A military memorial service will be held on Monday, June 20, at 3:00 p.m. at the Northern Nevada Veterans Memorial Cemetery, 14 Veterans Way, Fernley NV 89408; (775) 575-4441. Anyone may attend either or both.
Union man Kelley dies
Sparks Tribune 6-20-2011Kelley Eulogy
6-18-2011
Kelley was a 63-year member of International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 1245/AFL-CIO.
He returned from World War II with a Purple Heart and a finger mangled by German shrapnel. When he sought work at at NVE predecessor Sierra Pacific Power, the company wouldn't hire him because his bent finger wouldn't fit into a company safety glove.
Kelley had the finger amputated in order to go to work for the utility and went on to become a highly-respected foreman, troubleman and a leader in IBEW Local 1245's Reno unit in the 1950's.
Last year, Kelley became heavily involved in the union's campaign to defend retiree medical benefits at the statewide utility. He was featured in full-page newspapers ads as well as 60-second television spots that told his compelling story of service and sacrifice.
Over the next several days, Local 1245 will feature its 2010 interview with Brother Kelley in six video installments in its online media library.
The union deeply mourns the passing of this extraordinary union brother.Local 1245 has represented workers at NV Energy since 1945. Overall, the union represents roughly 20,000 energy workers in Nevada and California.
Anyone wanting to share personal remembrances may send them here where they will be permanently posted.
IN MEMORIAM
My Admiration. My condolences My respects. Let us all realize Mr. Kelley memorializes labor's fact of life: UNTIL THE STRUGGLE IS WON, THE STRUGGLE GOES ON. May that effort and fortitude illuminate and resonate in all our battles. — Paul L. DePierro, VP, Paradise Democratic Club; Member, Teamsters 631- Las Vegas, Nevada.
RELATED LINKS
Shame on NV Energy Asks Board Chair Philip Satre to Release Internal Report on Ensign-Yackira Scandal
IBEW 1245 / 6-28-2011RETIRED NV ENERGY WORKERS FILE FEDERAL LAWSUIT AGAINST UTILITY
NV Energy has refused to negotiate with retirees for eighteen months despite taking away benefits to which they already
5-19-2011NV Energy Shareholders Approve Accountability Measure Backed by Retirees
5-3-2011Still Sierra Pacific Powerful
Barbwire by Barbano / Daily Sparks Tribune / 1-16-2011Barbwire Energy/Consumer War Room
Mary Valencia Wilson: Nevada's Aztec Warrior
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 6-12-2011 Daily Sparks Tribune
Skinned and Barbecued
GOP governor and lawmakers turn Democrats into Jimmy Carter's attack rabbit
Dennis Myers / Reno News & Review / 6-16-2011Workers only got worked over by the "jobs-jobs-jobs" legislature
Dennis Myers / Reno News & Review / 6-9-20112011 Legislative Session Became a War Against Workers
And with the neglect of media stenographers, the workers lost —> badly
Reno News & Review Editorial / 6-9-2011
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.
HAT TRICK 2010:
Barbwire wins third straight Nevada Press Association first-place award
The 2009 first-place Nevada Press Association award winners
Tony the Tiger & the flaky NFL
Barbwire / 11-30-2008
Deregulation is never having to say you're sorry
Barbwire / 8-3-2008
Nevada: A good place to visit, but do you want to live here?
Barbwire / 6-15-2008
The price of a piece/6-17-2007
Boxing Pandora/9-23-2007
The Lady in the Red Dress
10-28-2007Barbwire.TV
Click here for on-demand re-runs
from the 2009 and 2011 legislative sessions(775) 882-8255
[882-TALK]Barbwire.TV:
15-year overnight success
Daily Sparks Tribune 2-10-2008The Barbwire's Greatest Hits
Highlights from radio days
mp3 fileNevada government's license to kill
A funeral dirge for the disposable worker
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 6-5-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneBarbwire.TV 5-31-2011
The Mining Addiction
Barbwire banned in prime timeMay 31, 2011
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
For more information contact
Andrew Barbano
(775) 786-1455
BARBWIRE.TV LIVE TONIGHT
Regional live call-in program
7-8:00 p.m. PDT / 02:00 ZULU-GMT 6-1
Barbwire banned in network prime time
CARSON CITY, Nev. – Mark Twain's beloved Comstock Historic District is once again under threat from a predatory mining company which can legally eat Nevada communities royalty free.
Tonight's guest will be Nevada author and publisher David Toll representing the Comstock Residents Association. He and his wife Robin Cobbey were featured in Sunday's San Francisco Chronicle which focused on the threat to the Comstock from the latest open pit operation funded by non-Nevada speculators.
The Barbwire with Andrew Barbano airs at 7:00 p.m. PDT on northwestern Nevada cable networks. Online viewers may access a live webstream via NevadaLabor.com.
The live in-studio call-in line is 882-TALK (775-882-8255).
The Barbwire will cablecast live at 7:00 p.m. PST on Charter regional cable: Carson City/Dayton digital channels 210 and 226 and Reno-Sparks-Washoe Charter digital 216. Internet viewers may view the program as it happens by accessing a link through the front page of NevadaLabor.com. An archived copy will be available for web viewers later in the week.
Rerun times and dates of this and previous shows will be posted as they are scheduled.
Prime time commercial network reruns of the Barbwire may be a thing of the past. A network censor viewed the May 17 program about workers rights and deemed it a "political" rather than a "public affairs" program and thus not suitable for prime time, notwithstanding that we pay for the privilege.
Anyone who knows the difference between politics and public affairs, please call me.
Translation: If it's bland, boring and non-controversial like apple pie and quilting bees, it's OK. Anyway, it belongs at 6:00 a.m. on Sunday when the all the people interested in politics always tune in.
Johnny Carson used to call the network censor Miss Priscilla Goodbody.
Unlike so many others today, she will always have a job.Be well. Raise hell.
-30-
Déjà vu, dustbusters and living legacies
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 5-29-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneAnti-teacher TV star unmasked as fraud
LV CityLife / 5-27-2011Clinging to the Ledge: Cold War
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 5-22-2011 Daily Sparks Tribune
Updated 5-25-2011: TV SHOW RERUN SCHEDULE ANNOUNCEDCarson City 12 noon Thursday, May 19, 2011
Workers rally for good jobs at good wages
Proposed "reforms" will devastate Nevada's already eroded wage baseRead Paul McKenzie's remarks to the more than 300 in attendance
CARSON CITY, Nev. – "The proposed cures are worse than the disease," according to Building and Construction Trades Council of Northern Nevada/AFL-CIO Executive Secretary-Treasurer Paul McKenzie. (See below.)
Nevada workers will rally for good jobs at good wages in front of the Nevada legislative building in Carson City at 12 noon on Thursday, May 19.
"We will counter the spin of big business that the solution to all of Nevada's fiscal problems lies in destroying Nevada's working class," McKenzie said.
"They want to dismantle the prevailing wage law, eliminate collective bargaining for the small percentage of public workers who currently have it, end binding arbitration, and make union workers fire-at-will employees like the unrepresented majority," McKenzie asserted.
"Just as Wall Street has done, the victims of corporate greed are being blamed for a problem they did not create. The proposed reforms consist entirely of destroying Nevada's working men and women," he added.
Modeled after the federal Davis-Bacon Act, the Nevada prevailing wage law (Nevada Revised Statutes Section 338) mandates that public construction projects pay workers according to the state labor commissioner's annual survey of contractor pay scales.
"A large number of publicly available studies prove that public works projects paying area-standard wages are good for the local economy," McKenzie noted. [1]
"The pay scales of the skilled trades act as benchmarks for the wages of all workers in any given area. A threat to the wages of the highly-trained is a threat to the paychecks of everyone," McKenzie said.
For every 10 percent increase in the unionization in a market, the wages of all workers rise about five percent. [2]
"Big corporations come to Nevada, exploit its workers and take the profits out of the state and often out of the country. A big part of my job is filing complaints against carpetbaggers who underpay their employees and leave the state before the cumbersome system can react. Any erosion of the prevailing wage law would make it open season on construction workers, two of three of whom are currently out of work," McKenzie said.
_______
1. A compilation of independent academic studies on the benefits of prevailing wage laws may be accessed at the Sheet Metal Contractors Assn. of America website. http://www.smacna.org/legislative/index.cfm?fuseaction=studies
One excerpt: "An independent research study conducted by the University of Missouri at Kansas City indicates that repeal of the prevailing wage statute in Missouri would not save dollars on construction costs and would result in a negative economic impact on the state's families and taxpayers as well as the state and regional economies."
2. Among others, see What Do Unions Do? by Harvard professors Richard B. Freeman and James L. Medoff, Basic Books, 1984; Harvard University Press, 1987.The neverending story
PROTESTING THE DEPORTATION OF NEVADA JOBS (Reno, Nev., 5-13-2010) — TOP: More than 200 union construction workers march on the UNR campus. BOTTOM: Reno Gazette-Journal reporter Victor Calderon interviews Paul McKenzie, executive secretary-treasurer of the Building and Construction Trades Council of Northern Nevada AFL-CIO while Painters Local 567 retiree Mo Hursh poses as the Grim Reaper. [UPDATE: Brother Hursh and his sleeping quarters were also prominently featured in front of the ledge on 5-19-2011.] TV this week:
Freedom Riders and wage defenders
Since they're blaming the victims, it's high time for the victims to fight back.
Live with your phone calls throughout northwestern Nevada Tuesday, 5-17
7:00 p.m. PDT 5-17-2011 / 02:00 5-18 ZULU/GMT —> Click above for live webstreaming
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 5-15-2011 Daily Sparks Tribune
Updated 5-16-2011, 5-17-2011
COPS & BURGERS SHOW 'N' SHINE FOR SPECIAL OLYMPICSAndrew: The Cops & Burgers-2011 Event to support the SPECIAL OLYMPICS NEVADA Program will be held on Sunday, June 5, 2011, at the Grand Sierra Resort. The event will be from 11:00 AM to 4:00 PM. Hamburgers, chips and a beverage are only $5 and all money is donated to the SPECIAL OLYMPICS NEVADA Program to support the events that allow the participants of our community to engage in 12 sports programs including Skiing, Aquatics, Basketball, Bocce, Bowling, Hockey, Golf, Powerlifting, Soccer, Softball and Track and Field events. Nevada has over 4,000 registered young people in the various programs with no one ever turned away due to a lack of finances. 100% of the proceeds collected at this event are returned to the program. SPECIAL OLYMPICS NEVADA does not receive any state or federal funding and all programs are offered FREE of charge.
Along with a classic car Show-N-Shine car show, which has a $20 dollar registration fee and includes a meal ticket and goodie bag, the event will have Police Equipment Exhibits, Ricky & Cheryl Ruiz's NEVADA RATTLER Nitro Roadster Dragster, Nevada Humane Society, large vehicle exhibits and exhibits from various sponsors of this event. The Masonic Lodge once again will be providing the Child ID Program at no charge to all parents who participate. A raffle booth will be open throughout the event with some great prizes that have been donated by the local business community.
Major sponsors of this event include; Grand Sierra Resort Casino, SaveMart Supermarkets, United Auto Workers Union Local 2162 - General Motors Parts Division, Nevada Air National Guard, Painters & Allied Trades District Council 16, Northern Nevada Central Labor Council, Nevada Humane Society and various local Reno and Sparks business that have donated to the program. Denny's Restaurants of Sparks, Nev., will provide coupons that will donate 10% of dining purchased with those coupons to SPECIAL OLYMPICS NEVADA.
Seven peoples choice awards will be given out to the registered car participants including awards by the mayors of Reno and Sparks, The Nevada Governor's award and the Special Olympics Choice award with the winning car selected by members of Special Olympics Nevada.Come and join us for a day of fun, exhibits, prizes and a great meal while donating to a local community event.
Thank you for your support,
Gary Brown
Cops & Burgers-2011 Event Chairman
775-856-1459LV IATSE LOCAL 720 LEADER MEL TURNER DIES
1935-2011MSGT. MELVIN TURNER U.S. Air Force, Retired Melvin Lawrence Turner unexpectedly passed away May 5, 2011, with family at his bedside. Mel was born March 27, 1935, in Peabody, Kan. He graduated from Abraham Lincoln H.S. in San Jose, Calif., in 1952 and joined the U.S. Navy in 1953. He met the love of his life, Darla Kay Delaforce, and married her July 14, 1956. He transferred to the U.S. Air Force in 1957 and was stationed abroad three times before moving to Las Vegas in 1974, where he retired at Nellis AFB.
He then joined the IATSE Local 720 as a stagehand, worked in various venues and retired as head carpenter of Bally's Celebrity Room. Mel was an active member and past president of Local 720. At the time of his passing, he was president of the Stage Employees FCU and an employee trustee for both the Local 720's Pension and Wage Disability Trusts.
He was involved in the Boy Scouts of America for over 10 years with his sons and enjoyed wood working as well as travel. His community activism included supporting Opportunity Village, the Paradise Democratic Club and various other non-profit organizations.
He is survived by his sisters, Dorothy Bailey and Melva Irvine; sons, Michael, Christopher and Patrick Turner; daughter, Karri Martensen; grandchildren, Joshua Turner, Miqehl Martensen, Kelsey Turner, Logan Turner, Alyssa Turner, Perry Turner and KJ Martensen. Services will be at 12:40 p.m. Friday, June 3, at Southern Nevada Veterans Memorial Cemetery, 1900 Buchanan Blvd. in Boulder City. The memorial will follow at 2:30 p.m. at The Boulder Dam Hotel.
He is loved by many and will be greatly missed but now walks hand in hand with his angel.
A fine gentle man whom we will all miss! —BJ Thomas and Mad Mike Aupperle
Rest in peace, brother. You did well and you did good. — Barbano
UPDATED Friday, 13 May 2011, 10:41 a.m. PDT, 17:41 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
Teamsters blast Fallon layoffs targeting union workers
5-13-2011Slaves taxes, bread crumbs and another brick in the wall
There are no virgins in politics. The best you can hope for is that your friends treat you a little better than your enemies and promise to kiss you afterward.
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 5-8-2011 Daily Sparks Tribune
May Day! T-Rump reduces president to peanuts
Wobblies lead May Day human rights solidarity March through Reno
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 5-1-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneFOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT
Paul Lenart (775) 513-7523
Ramon Suro (775) 221-0738
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=203252126365593
MEDIA ADVISORY — May Day Human Rights Solidarity March
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.
HAT TRICK 2010:
Barbwire wins third straight Nevada Press Association first-place award
The 2009 first-place Nevada Press Association award winners
Tony the Tiger & the flaky NFL
Barbwire / 11-30-2008
Deregulation is never having to say you're sorry
Barbwire / 8-3-2008
Nevada: A good place to visit, but do you want to live here?
Barbwire / 6-15-2008
The price of a piece/6-17-2007
Boxing Pandora/9-23-2007
The Lady in the Red Dress
10-28-2007Barbwire.TV
Click here for on-demand re-runs
from the 2009 and 2011 legislative sessions(775) 882-8255
[882-TALK]Barbwire.TV:
15-year overnight success
Daily Sparks Tribune 2-10-2008The Barbwire's Greatest Hits
Highlights from radio days
mp3 fileRENO, NEVADA, USA — The United May Day Committee will march in downtown Reno on Sunday, May 1, the traditional labor day worldwide save for the United States.
Participants will gather Sunday between 12 noon and 1:00 p.m. PDT at Stewart Park on Wells Ave., just south of Ryland Ave., in Reno. At 1:00 p.m. they will march west on Stewart to Center Street, then turn north on Center to First, which will take them to the Reno City Hall plaza skating rink.
Speakers and rally begin at 1:30 p.m. They will march back to Stewart Park about 3:30 p.m. For more information, contact Paul Lenart (775) 513-7523, or Ramon Suro (775) 221-0738.
A partial list of those expected to speak, in alphabetical order by organization:American Federation of Government Employees Local 2152/AFL-CIO
Nicolo Pavlatos and John Copeland or David DeSilva
American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) Local 4041/AFL-CIO
Vishnu Subramaniam, Executive Director
Indian Health Board of Nevada — Claudia Castañeda-Melendez
Industrial Workers of the World (The Wobblies) — Paul Lenart
International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 1245/AFL-CIO
Rita Weisshaar, IBEW 1245/AFL-CIO retirees
Latino Coalition — Xiomara Rodriguez
Lesbian, Gay, Transgender & Bisexual Community — Angela Brooks
Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada — Bob Fulkerson, Elvira Diaz, Mario De La Rosa
Railroad Workers United — Ron Kaminkow
Reno-Sparks Indian Colony — Jan Gardipe
Reno-Sparks NAACP — Lonnie Feemster, President or Andrew Barbano, First Vice-President
Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Northern Nevada — Rev. Neal T. Anderson
University of Nevada-Reno Latino Student Advisory Board
Carla Castedo, President
Jeannette Salas
Beatriz Aguirre
Washoe County Commission — Commissioner Kitty Jung, D
The perils of playing the other guy's game
Obama botches gasoline price issue in Reno speech
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 4-24-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneYou can't run from the awful truth
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 4-17-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneUPDATED Tuesday, 12 April 2011, 12:30:41 a.m. PDT, 07:30:41 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
John Kennedy/April 12, 1961: "The exploration of our solar system is an ambition which we and all mankind share ... and this is an important step toward that goal."
On this date in 1883, Indian Agent John Mayhugh said there were about six hundred Indians on the Duck Valley reservation astride the Nevada/Idaho border north of Elko, that there was no chance of their joining any hostilities against whites, and that grain and vegetables on the reservation had been planted (in January Mayhugh had reported a population of 300); in 1919, amateur radio broadcasting at the University of Nevada, suspended during the world war, resumed; in 1939, President Franklin Roosevelt revoked one 1932 executive order issued by President Hoover and partially revoked a second one, both of which withdrew public land in Nevada and California from public use; in 1961, cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became the first human in space; in 1971, Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young's album Four Way Street went gold literally within hours of its release; in 1989, Abbie Hoffman died in New Hope, Pennsylvania; in 2001, U.S. Sens. Clinton and Reid heard testimony at Fallon, Nevada, on an alleged leukemia "cluster" in the town.
ABBIE HOFFMAN/Vanderbilt University/April 1989: "...in the nineteen-sixties, apartheid was driven out of America. Legal segregation — Jim Crow — ended. We didn't end racism, but we ended legal segregation. We ended the idea that you can send a million soldiers ten thousand miles away to fight in a war that people do not support. We ended the idea that women are second-class citizens. Now, it doesn't matter who sits in the Oval Office. But the big battles that were won in that period of civil war and strife you cannot reverse. We were young, we were reckless, arrogant, silly, headstrong — and we were right. I regret nothing."No more Mr. Nice Guy
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 4-10-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneUPDATED Sunday, 10 April 2011, 11:47:15 a.m. PDT, 18:47:15 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT — On this date in 1729, the American Weekly Mercury advertised for sale "An Indian woman and her child...She washes, irons and starches very well, and is a good cook."; in 1886, Lieutenant Governor Charles Laughton said he had received an 1883 Gatling gun from the U.S. Army's Watervliet Arsenal in New York (Nevada's lieutenant governor then served as state adjutant general); in 1905, there were press reports that the Union Pacific Railroad was planning to use the $100,000,000 raised by a new stock issue to drive a tunnel through the Sierra; in 1930, Chicana farm workers leader Delores Huerta was born in Dawson, New Mexico; in 1933, the U.S. Civilian Conservation Corps was created; in 1940, the Reminder, Boulder City's newspaper, changed its name to the Boulder City News; in 1942, the notorious forced march of Filipino and U.S. soldiers now known as the Bataan Death March began; in 1957 in Rick the Drummer, an episode of The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet, Ricky Nelson performed a cover version of Fats Domino's hit I'm Walkin', launching Ricky's singing career; in 1962, Beatle Stuart Sutcliffe died in Hamburg at age 22; in 1965, Nevada gambling lobbyist Gabriel Vogliotti said that a circulating initiative petition to increase gambling taxes "would end the industrynot hurt it, wreck it"; in 1971, Jeannette Rankin, the only member of Congress to vote against U.S. entry in both world wars, led a protest march on the Pentagon by 8,000 women against the war in Vietnam; in 1996, after Congress refused to include an exception to save the life of the woman in its provisions, President Clinton vetoed a ban on late term abortion while surrounded by five women whose physicians had advised the procedure to save their lives (the lay Catholic magazine Commonweal called them "weeping women"); in 2010, seventy years after the 1940 Soviet massacre of 22,000 Polish officers in the Katyn Woods, there was a second Polish tragedy at Katyn — a plane carrying Polish President Lech Kaczynski and a huge swath of Polish leadership to a commemoration of the massacre crashed in western Russia near the site of the massacre, crippling the Polish nation's political system and stalling Russian/Polish efforts to come to terms with the divisions created by the massacre (the plane crash dead included the president, a Solidarity union leader, national bank president, national security chief, deputy foreign minister, members of the Polish Parliament and army and navy chiefs).
UPDATED Wednesday, 6 April 2011, 02:48 p.m. PDT, 21:48 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —Activists rally against budget cuts
By Guy Clifton / Reno Gazette-Journal 4-5-2011UPDATED Monday, 4 April 2011, 01:17 p.m. PDT, 20:17 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT — Additional speakers announced for the April 4 solidarity rally: Sen. Ruben Kihuen, D-Las Vegas; Assemblymember Debbie Smith, D-Sparks; Lonnie Feemster, President, Reno-Sparks NAACP.
Saturday, 2 April 2011, 06:01 p.m. PDT, 01:01 3 April 2011 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
Workers and students rally at Western Nevada College in Carson City on Monday
43rd anniversary of the assassination of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
CARSON CITY, Nev. — College campuses in Carson City and Las Vegas will host Nevada's portion of a national unity rally on Monday, April 4, the 43rd anniversary of the assassination of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
The northern Nevada event begins at 4:30 p.m. at Rotary Plaza on the campus of Western Nevada College in Carson City. Featured speakers will include Nevada State AFL-CIO Executive Secretary-Treasurer Danny Thompson and Rev. Larry J. Holloway, pastor of Bethel AME Church in Sparks. State lawmakers are also expected.
"We will come together to demand a reasonable solution to the state budget crisis," Thompson says.
"Nevada unions, community partners, students and parents are joining together to raise public awareness that the governor's drastic budget cuts will dismantle education," he added.
"Republican lawmakers' solution to the budget crisis is an assault on workers, a classic example of advancing a pre-set agenda by using a problem rather than solving a problem," the longtime labor leader and former assemblyman added.
"Eliminating collective bargaining, workers' pensions,health benefits and prevailing wage protections constitutes a misguided and morally wrong attempt to take away the basic rights of workers," Thompson said.
Participants are urged to wear red as a symbol of support and to register for the rally at www.we-r-1.org/april4
"We stand in solidarity with working people in Wisconsin, Ohio, Indiana and dozens of other states where well-funded, right-wing corporate politicians are trying to take away the rights for which Dr. King fought and died," Thompson said.King had traveled to Memphis, Tenn., in support of striking union garbage workers when he was shot on April 4, 1968.
National NAACP President Benjamin Jealous stated that "on April 4, church leaders, civil rights activists and community members of all stripes will hold events around the country to say, as Dr. King did, that 'injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.'
"In recent months, we have witnessed attempts in North Carolina to amend state policy to accelerate the resegregation of its public schools, a widespread assault on voting rights — including an effort in Florida that would take up to 300,000 voters off the rolls, continued attacks on the rights of women and immigrants in addition to the well-publicized offensive on the rights of organized labor," Jealous added.
For more information on the Carson City event, contact Liz Sorenson at Communications Workers of America Local 9413/AFL-CIO at 775-322-9413.
The Las Vegas area event will also start at 4:30 p.m. at the Charleston Campus of Community College of Southern Nevada, 6375 W. Charleston Blvd., behind the Health & Sciences Building (K Building).A walk with the giants
The César Chávez Nevada Labor Hall of Fame Awards
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 4-3-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneUpdated March 31 yo'11
BREAKING NEWS
César Chávez Day in Nevada
EL DÍA DE CÉSAR CHÁVEZ¡Sí se puede!
Be well. Raise hell.César Chávez Celebration IX
Thursday/jueves, March/marzo 31, 2011
Circus Circus-Reno
Sponsorship & Ticket Information
Purchase online thru E-Bay's secure PayPal serviceCésar Chávez IX Celebracion del 2011
Jueves 31 DE Marzo, 2011 en Circus Circus de RenoCésar Chávez and Dr. King still lead us
Barbwire by Barbano / Reno Gazette-Journal Guest Editorial / 3-31-2011
The César Chávez Long March
by Reno artist Erik Holland
Mr. Holland will be selling cards and prints at the March 31 César Chávez celebration at Circus Circus in Reno. The original watercolor is currently displayed at the Nevada Legislature in the office of Sen. Ruben Kihuen, D-Las Vegas.Copyright © 2009 Erik Holland. All rights reserved.
UNR students honor César Chávez March 28
César Chávez, Dr. King and the kids are alright
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 3-27-2011 Daily Sparks Tribune
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.
HAT TRICK 2010:
Barbwire wins third straight Nevada Press Association first-place award
The 2009 first-place Nevada Press Association award winners
Tony the Tiger & the flaky NFL
Barbwire / 11-30-2008
Deregulation is never having to say you're sorry
Barbwire / 8-3-2008
Nevada: A good place to visit, but do you want to live here?
Barbwire / 6-15-2008
The price of a piece/6-17-2007
Boxing Pandora/9-23-2007
The Lady in the Red Dress
10-28-2007Barbwire.TV
Click here for on-demand re-runs
from the 2009 and 2011 legislative sessions(775) 882-8255
[882-TALK]Barbwire.TV:
15-year overnight success
Daily Sparks Tribune 2-10-2008The Barbwire's Greatest Hits
Highlights from radio days
mp3 fileCésar Chávez Celebration IX
Thursday/jueves, March/marzo 31, 2011
Circus Circus-Reno
Sponsorship & Ticket Information
Purchase online thru E-Bay's secure PayPal serviceCésar Chávez IX Celebracion del 2011
Jueves 31 DE Marzo, 2011 en Circus Circus de Reno
UPDATED Friday, 25 March, 2011, 00:04:46 a.m. PDT, 07:04:46 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —We just come to work here, we don't come to die: Triangle Shirtwaist Holocaust Centennial
Triangle2: Wal-Mart Bangladesh
Harold Meyerson / Washington Post November 28, 2012AFL-CIO: Echoes of the Triangle fire resonate in today's shadow sweatshop economy
Déjà Vu all over again
Triangle lessons lost on us today?On this date in 1896, a measles epidemic in Lincoln County was hitting Native Americans particularly hard, with six of them dead in a week; in 1911, a fire broke out in New York's Triangle Shirtwaist Factory, killing 146 people, 132 of them (Italian, Russian, Hungarian and German) girls, and disclosure of the lack of safety exits and fire escapes and the condition of the building became a turning point in social policy and politics in the United States, made reformer Francis Perkins famous (she had witnessed the fire from her home), showed the value of unions and galvanized the union movement, led to workers injury insurance, shorter work weeks, an end to child labor, and not-guilty verdicts on manslaughter charges against the factory owners) [EDITOR'S NOTE: From 1933 to 1945, Ms. Perkins served as secretary of labor in President Franklin D. Roosevelt's administration, the first woman in American history to hold a cabinet position. The despicable sweatshop owners made money on the mostly-immigrant deaths, an insurance payout of $400 per worker.]; in 1917, a representative of a new national organization, the League to Enforce Peace, arrived in Reno to form a local chapter and advance an April speech in Reno by former Minnesota governor Adolph Eberhart (peace organizing was very risky during the world war because the Wilson administration prosecuted it under the Espionage Act); in 1926, a Parent Teachers Association chapter was organized at Sparks Junior High School; in 1939, with war talk common, the Nevada Bureau of Mines was doing a study of the prospects for development of strategic war minerals in the state; in 1958, John Ensign, now U.S. senator from Nevada, was born in Roseville, California; in 1961, Elvis performed at Pearl Harbor to raise money for the U.S.S. Arizona memorial (it was his last public performance for nine years); in 1966, The Fab Four posed for the "butcher cover" of their Yesterday and Today album; in 1970, Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young's only album, the magnificent Déjà Vu (containing Teach Your Children, Helpless, Our House, Woodstock), went gold; in 1975 in a Nevada Assembly judiciary committee hearing on a measure to hike the penalties for marijuana possession, ACLU of Nevada lobbyist Richard Siegel pointed out that jail time for possession in Nevada was already six times longer than the maximum sentence possible for conspiracy to murder (the committee responded by ordering a bill draft to make jail time equal for the two crimes); in 1992, cosmonaut Sergei Krikalev returned to a changed world after ten months on the Mir space station (his nation, the Soviet Union, no longer existed); in 2001, Russell Crowe accepted an Academy Award with remarks that recalled his hopes as a child: "But this moment is directly connected to those childhood imaginings. And for anybody who's on the downside of advantage and relying purely on courage, it's possible."
The Reagan Ranch, hall of famers and protest fatigue
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 3-20-2011 Daily Sparks Tribune / Updated 3-21-2011
UPDATED Saturday, 19 March, 2011, 00:04:26 a.m. PDT, 07:04:26 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —March 19/eight years of war
Sacramento Daily Union/March 19, 1860: MEN WANTED! The undersigned wishes to hire ten or a dozen men, familiar with the management of horses, as hostlers, or riders on the Overland Express Route via Salt Lake City. Wages $50 per month and found. I may be found at the St. George Hotel during Sunday, Monday and Tuesday. — WILLIAM W. FINNEY
On this date in 1874, President Grant signed an executive order reserving land in the region of Walker Lake, Nevada "for the use of the Pah-Ute Indians residing thereon"; in 1918, Iowa farmer Raymond Hall of Minerva, who had just been exempted from the draft on an agricultural exemption, was dragged from his home by a group of eight men, driven eight miles into the country, painted head to toe in yellow and black, and left to walk home. (Hall attributed the action not to resentment of his exemption but to jealousy for his recent marriage to Miss Grace Jones); in 1926, Genovaite Cizauskas, matriarch of the Cizauskas clan that has included a diplomat, NPR reporter, hangliding instructor, brewing exec and Fannie Mae exec, was born Genovaite Ambraziejus in Brooklyn; in 1943, the Reno USO Council held a meeting to decide what to do after the owner of a building rented for a USO center for African American soldiers cancelled the rental agreement, returned the rent check and told Mayor Froehlich he had received complaints from nearby property owners; in 1953, the Academy Award for best writing of a motion picture story was presented to Ian McLellan Hunter for Roman Holiday. (Hunter was a beard for blacklisted writer Dalton Trumbo, who actually wrote the screenplay; on December 15, 1992, the Academy of Motion Picture Acts and Sciences board of governors voted to change the records and credit Trumbo and the Oscar was presented to Trumbo's widow on May 10 1993); in 1960, Joseph and Victor Saturno of Reno, who gave Bank of America stock shares to every resident of impoverished San Marco, Italy, were planning a trip to the town to attend the unveiling of sculptures of the two mens' parents; in 1968, a group of "wise men" presidential advisors convened by President Johnson, many of whom were instrumental in getting the United States into Vietnam, advised Johnson to get out of Vietnam; in 2003, the United States government launched an unprovoked attack on Iraq, prompting a wave of protests around the world and in the U.S., some of which gridlocked urban areas.It ain't broke, but we'll fix it
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 3-13-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneCharlie Sheen and the Price of Gasoline
ENERGY, PART DEUX: PUC sides with electrical workers, orders NV Energy staffing investigation
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 3-6-2011 Daily Sparks Tribune
UPDATED Thursday, 3 March, 2011, 1:38:05 PST, 9:38:05 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
UPDATED Wednesday, 2 March, 2011, 11:55:08 PST, 19:55:08 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
FROM THE WOBBLIES: Rally for UNR public education
TODAY (March 2) 5:00 p.m. PST
In front of Getchell Library, University of Nevada-Reno
March 2, 2011
IMPORTANT LEGISLATIVE ANNOUNCEMENT
TO: ALL AFFILIATES
FROM: DANNY L. THOMPSON
RE: HEARING AT CSN – CHEYENNE CAMPUS – FRIDAY, MARCH 4, 2010
The Legislature will hear another bill designed to put Nevadans back to work on Friday, March 4, 2010 at 1PM. The skills assessment program will provide an analysis of an unemployed worker’s skills, provide a Career Readiness Certificate based on scores, and open up more employment opportunities for that individual.
Please attend this hearing and request unemployed workers to attend. We are hoping to have 100 or so individuals attending at the College of Southern Nevada, Cheyenne Campus. Some of them should testify about being unemployed and indicate that this legislation will help them.
This is another piece of legislation presented by lawmakers that will help get Nevadans back to work. We need to do our part and show support for these measures!
WHAT: Hearing by Select Committee on Economic Growth and Employment
Skills Assessment Program for Unemployed Workers
WHERE: Community College of Southern Nevada, Cheyenne Campus, Las Vegas
Arberry Telecommunications Bldg. Room 1772
When: Friday, March 4, 2011 1:00 p.m. PST
Request: Unemployed workers to attend and some to speak regarding their story of being unemployed and supporting this legislation
Thank you for all you do.
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.
HAT TRICK 2010:
Barbwire wins third straight Nevada Press Association first-place award
The 2009 first-place Nevada Press Association award winners
Tony the Tiger & the flaky NFL
Barbwire / 11-30-2008
Deregulation is never having to say you're sorry
Barbwire / 8-3-2008
Nevada: A good place to visit, but do you want to live here?
Barbwire / 6-15-2008
The price of a piece/6-17-2007
Boxing Pandora/9-23-2007
The Lady in the Red Dress
10-28-2007Barbwire.TV
Click here for on-demand re-runs
from the 2009 and 2011 legislative sessions(775) 882-8255
[882-TALK]Barbwire.TV:
15-year overnight success
Daily Sparks Tribune 2-10-2008The Barbwire's Greatest Hits
Highlights from radio days
mp3 fileDATE: February 28, 2011
TO: All Southern Nevada Affiliates
FROM: Danny L. Thompson, Executive Secretary-Treasurer
Nevada State AFL-CIO
RE: Legislative Field Hearing on Budget in Las Vegas
Governor Brian Sandoval’s budget would take $270 away from every student in Nevada schools. What does this mean? It means classes will have 40 children, all-day kindergarten will be eliminated as will many programs and the higher education system is being dismantled.
The Governor’s budget also takes away half the school bond reserves, which could reduce the jobs created by building new schools and updating old schools.
We need our members to attend this hearing and speak up about this draconian budget. Tell the Committee that you believe to a balanced approach to secure Nevada’s future. Creating jobs and investing in education is the way to secure Nevada’s future.
When: February 28, 2011
What: The Legislative Joint Committee on K-12 Education and Higher Education — The Senate Committee on Finance and Assembly Ways & Means Review of the Governor’s Budget on Education
Where: Green Valley High School, 460 Arroyo Grande Blvd, Henderson, NV 89014
Time: 5PM – 7PM PST
Please recruit members to attend and to testify as mothers, fathers, grandparents, and citizens who want to secure Nevada’s future.UPDATE: SRO CROWD PACKS MEETING, URGES LAWMAKERS NOT TO GUT EDUCATION
LAS VEGAS SUN 2-28-2011Cowboys and Indians
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 2-27-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneToo old to work, too young to die
Nevadans rally statewide in support of Wisconsin workers at high noon on President's Day
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 2-20-2011 Daily Sparks Tribune
UPDATE: Great Minds Think Alike Dept. The stakes could not be higher.UPDATE: Sunday, 13 Feb. 2011 12:42:37 p.m. PST, 20:42:37 ZULU/GMT/SUT/CUT —
John Adams/February 13, 1818: The Revolution was effected before the war commenced. The Revolution was in the hearts and minds of the people. This radical change in the principles, opinions, sentiments, and affections of the people, was the real American Revolution.
On this date in 1861, Colonel Bernard Irwin, an army surgeon, began a trek to rescue a unit of infantry that was besieged by the Chiricahua Apaches, an action that (33 years later) received the first Medal of Honor citation; in 1912, Nevada Attorney General Cleveland Baker was hospitalized in Oakland and "grave fears" about his recovery brought family members to his bedside; in 1937, Episcopal vicar William Stonson said that "paganism" was disappearing from the Pyramid Lake Indian Reservation (the tribe made no evaluation of paganism among the Episcopalians); in 1942 in a memorandum to U.S. Secretary of War Henry Stimson recommending the evacuation and internment of west coast citizens, Army General John DeWitt explained the fact that no Japanese Americans had been suspected or accused of sabotage or other related crimes by writing "The very fact that no sabotage has taken place to date is a disturbing and confirming indication that such action will be taken."; in 1946, homecoming African-American veteran Isaac Woodard was blinded while being mistreated by Atlanta police, an incident described in the Woody Guthrie song The Ballad of Isaac Woodard; in 1956, Nevada's Plymouth Rock, an episode of Death Valley Days, dealt with Nevada's entry into the union; in 1967, The Beatles single Penny Lane b/w Strawberry Fields Forever was released in the U.S. (in Britain on the 17th), signaling the group‚s growing use of electronically produced music (it was one of those rare 45s that produced hits on both sides); in 1975, members of the Nevada Senate budget committee scrutinizing the athletic funding of the University of Nevada-Las Vegas, said they worried that "the tail is wagging the dog" with academics becoming secondary to athletics; in 2002, Jason Disney of Fallon died in Afghanistan; in 2006, forty-six years after its first U.S. publication, Elie Wiesel's Night hit number one on the New York Times best seller list; in 2011 at 10:15 in the morning, the cost of the Iraq war reached $774,069,284,061 ($6,934,170,660 of that amount was paid by Nevadans).The cost of the war in Iraq on February 13:
2004 $100,801,621,000
2005 $154,198,165,392
2007 $366,069,655,984
2008 $494,029,452,199
2009 $596,575,266,002
2011 $774,069,284,061In 2008, Nobel economist Joseph Stiglitz and Harvard public policy analyst Linda Bilmes said the full costs of the Iraq war were hidden, such as a $5-per-barrel oil price increase and the homefront fiscal impacts of a war paid for with debt. They wrote that at that point the cost topped $3 trillion. In 2010, Stiglitz and Bilmes wrote that in 2008 they had substantially undercounted the hidden costs of the war.
A Valentine for Tura Satana —>Union Star
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 2-13-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneIN MEMORIAM OF OUR FIGHTING UNION SISTER
Tura Satana, as we will always remember herUPDATE: Tuesday, 8 Feb. 2011 03:27 PST, 23:57 ZULU/GMT/SUT/CUT — Tura Satana (Jurman), noted 1960's actress (Irma La Douce; Faster Pussycat, Kill! Kill!) died Friday, Feb.4, in Reno, Nevada, at age 72. In her later years, she was a union activist and instrumental in making the Reno Hilton (now the Grand Sierra Resort) a union shop. The Security Police and Fire Professionals of America won the fight because Tom Stoneburner and Tura would not break solidarity — even after all were illegally fired. More as matters develop. Watch the Sunday Barbwire in the Daily Sparks Tribune. Adios, beautiful lady. Say hi to Stoney for us. — Andrew (Click here for Tura's Wikipedia page. Please send photos, memories, remembrances for permanent posting at this site. AB)
40 Years on the High Desert Plantation
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 2-6-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneBarack Brian Obama Sandoval Carter
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 1-30-2011 Daily Sparks Tribune
UPDATE SATURDAY 29 Jan 2011 08:55:32 PST, 16:55:32 ZULU/GMT/SUT/CUT —
Learned Hand/January 29 1955: Heretics have been hateful from the beginning of recorded time; they have been ostracized, exiled, tortured, maimed, and butchered; but it has generally proved impossible to smother them, and when it has not, the society that has succeeded has always declined.
On this date in 1802, John Beckley was appointed the first librarian of Congress; in 1834, setting an ominous precedent later used by other presidents, President Jackson used federal troops to break labor unrest by workers on the C&O Canal construction who were protesting low pay and dangerous conditions; in 1918, actor John Forsythe was born (he starred in the 1952 movie Captive City, filmed in Carson City and Reno) in Penn Grove, New Jersey; in 1946, Reno Mayor Harry Stewart appointed a committee to study the possibility of a joint city/county jail and report back in a week; in 1961 in a sermon in New York City, Methodist minister Ralph Sockman said people should not test God to meet conditions they create: "God's ways are above our own ways as the heavens are above the earth."; in 1967, Big Brother (with Janis Joplin), The Grateful Dead, Moby Grape and Allen Ginsberg performed in a benefit at the Avalon Ballroom in San Francisco; in 1969, hundreds of students rioted at Clark High School in Las Vegas; in 1980, six U.S. diplomats, hidden by the Canadian embassy in Teheran since the takeover of the U.S. embassy in November, boarded a flight for Zürich while using Canadian passports at Mehrabad Airport and flew safely out of the country (the Canadians closed down their embassy and accompanied the U.S. diplomats out of the country); in 2002, Chuck DeWitt of the Nevada Railroad Museum got the old Carson City U.S. Mint Building coin press operating and struck several medallions.
Date: Fri, 28 Jan 2011 09:55:26 PST, 17:55:26 ZULU/GMT/SUT/CUT — On this date in 1898, Hugh O'Flaherty, an Irish Catholic priest who organized an operation that rescued and secreted at least 3925 Allied prisoners and Jews in Nazi-occupied Rome, was born in Cahersiveen, Ireland (O'Flaherty received the Order of the British Empire and the U.S. Medal of Freedom, but in his native Ireland is remembered only with a grove of trees in Killarney National Park; see below); in 1905, a Carson and Colorado train wreck in Mound House piled up seven cars, one of them filled with dynamite, nitroglycerine and blasting caps, but no explosion occurred; in 1905 the Deseret News (Salt Lake City) reported "The townsite of Las Vegas has been platted and will, in all probability, be allotted next week. This is the official townsite and has no connection with the other exploited by speculators. At the present time the railroad company is not allowing any trespassing on its townsite and a man armed with a club patrols along the bank of the creek and turns back any individuals who are not wanted. In this manner many of the residents of the fake townsite are kept on their own domain. Law and order at last maintains at Las Vegas, because if there is any fuss all hands turn out with clubs and beat up the offenders."; in 1941, Alice Brock was born (you can get anything you want at Alice's restaurant); in 1947, an anti-government uprising in Taiwan (Formosa) was suppressed with sadistic violence by the Chiang Kai-shek regime and led to a long period during which tens of thousands disappeared, went to prison, or were murdered; in 1955, a group of Israeli commandos attacked and destroyed an Egyptian military camp near the town of Gaza on the Gaza strip, an unprovoked attack (in an area that rarely saw violence) that Danish, Belgian and Swedish investigators later condemned as a "shocking outrage of extreme gravity and a clear provocation to the Egyptian military forces" and that set off an arms race between Egypt and Israel; in 1986, former Swedish Prime Minister Olaf Palme, a hero to U.S. troops and peace activists for opposing the Vietnam war and providing a refuge in Sweden for war objectors and for his criticism of Soviet suppression of the Czech uprising, was assassinated in Stockholm.
Hugh O'Flaherty's Trees
by Brendan Kennelly
There is a tree called freedom and it grows
Somewhere in the hearts of men,
Rain falls, ice freezes, wind blows,
The tree shivers, steadies itself again,
Steadies itself like Hugh O'Flaherty's hand,
Guiding trapped and hunted people, day and night,
To what all hearts love and understand,
The tree of freedom upright in the light.
Mediterranean Palm, Italian Cypress, Holm Oak, Stone Pine;
A peaceful grove in honour of that man,
Commemorates all who struggle to be free.
The hurried world is a slave of time,
Wise men are victims of their shrewdest plans.
Date: Thu, 27 Jan 2011 12:36:53 PST, 20:36:53 ZULU/GMT/SUT/CUT —
Trial of the Chicago Seven/January 27 1970:
Prosecutor Richard Schultz: We ask that you only relate conversations pursuant to questions.
Judge Julius Hoffman: That is right.
Schultz: If you are asked about a telephone call, you can tell about it, but you can't mix them all up.
Witness Norman Mailer: You are quite right. I have been exposed to the world as a man possessed of a rambling mind.
On this date in 1781, after more than 200 colonials whose enlistments had ended prepared to leave for home and George Washington forced them back into military service, he then compelled several members of the group to serve as a firing squad and kill their leaders ("This was a most painful task, and when ordered to load, some of them shed tears," reported a unit physician); in 1905, a day after his appointment as a deputy sheriff of Esmeralda County, Nevada, Virgil Earp was sworn into office; in 1909, a terrible fire in the Sutro tunnel (which drained the Comstock Lode mines) was being battled in shifts by miners, some of whom were overcome by gas and not expected to live, and nearby towns were doing without electricity so it could be diverted to pumps and other equipment (Comstock mining corporations lost half their value on the San Francisco exchange); in 1945 at Auschwitz Birkenau, the Soviet Army liberated the remaining 7,000 survivors of the death camp; in 1953 at the Commodore Hotel in New York City, Ralph Ellison received the National Book Award for Invisible Man, which he called his "not quite fully achieved attempt at a major novel"; in 1967, astronauts Virgil Grissom, Edward White and Roger Chafee died in the Apollo 1 module in a launch pad fire; in 1998, President Clinton appointed assistant Clark County district attorney Johnnie Rawlinson to be a U.S. District Court judge.
Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2011 00:46:48 PST, 08:46:48 ZULU/GMT/SUT/CUT — On this date in 1654, Portugal ordered Jewish and Dutch settlers in Brazil (some of whom had already been forced to leave Portugal) to leave the country within three months, and some of them ended up in New Amsterdam (New York); in 1784, Benjamin Franklin opposed the selection of the eagle as the U.S. national bird because it is a scavenger and instead championed the turkey (see below); in 1892, the ice harvest was underway on the Truckee River; in 1936, U.S. Bureau of Reclamation director Elwood Mead died (Lake Mead behind Hoover Dam is named for him); in 1962, Bishop Joseph A. Burke of the New York Catholic Diocese of Buffalo declared the Twist (a dance in which the boy and girl never touch) to be impure and banned it from Catholic schools in the diocese; in 1967, Governor Paul Laxalt said he had dropped prison inmates as staff members at the governor's mansion: "We decided we would feel more comfortable with our own trusted help."; in 1988, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger (EDITOR'S NOTE: He is now better known as Pope Benedict XV) of Germany, prefect of the Inquisition, visited New York under the sponsorship of the conservative Rutherford Institute and was snubbed by rabbis because of his contention that "the faith of Abraham finds its fulfillment" in "the reality of Jesus Christ" and picketed by gays because of his anti-gay comments; in 1998, somebody famously said "Now, I have to go back to work on my State of the Union speech. And I worked on it until pretty late last night. But I want to say one thing to the American people. I want you to listen to me. I'm going to say this again. I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky. I never told anybody to lie, not a single time, never. These allegations are false. And I need to go back to work for the American people."; in 2001, former Reno barber Loyd "Dutch" Myers died in the Philippines; in 2005, Christopher Lee Weaver of Las Vegas died in Iraq near the Syrian border.Benjamin Franklin: For my own part I wish the Bald Eagle had not been chosen the Representative of our Country. He is a Bird of bad moral Character. He does not get his Living honestly. You may have seen him perched on some dead Tree near the River, where, too lazy to fish for himself, he watches the Labour of the Fishing Hawk; and when that diligent Bird has at length taken a Fish, and is bearing it to his Nest for the Support of his Mate and young Ones, the Bald Eagle pursues him and takes it from him.
With all this Injustice, he is never in good Case but like those among Men who live by Sharping & Robbing he is generally poor and often very lousy. Besides he is a rank Coward: The little King Bird not bigger than a Sparrow attacks him boldly and drives him out of the District. He is therefore by no means a proper Emblem for the brave and honest Cincinnati of America who have driven all the King birds from our Country....
For the Truth the Turkey is in Comparison a much more respectable Bird, and withal a true original Native of America... He is besides, though a little vain & silly, a Bird of Courage, and would not hesitate to attack a Grenadier of the British Guards who should presume to invade his Farm Yard with a red Coat on.
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.
HAT TRICK 2010:
Barbwire wins third straight Nevada Press Association first-place award
The 2009 first-place Nevada Press Association award winners
Tony the Tiger & the flaky NFL
Barbwire / 11-30-2008
Deregulation is never having to say you're sorry
Barbwire / 8-3-2008
Nevada: A good place to visit, but do you want to live here?
Barbwire / 6-15-2008
The price of a piece/6-17-2007
Boxing Pandora/9-23-2007
The Lady in the Red Dress
10-28-2007Barbwire.TV
Click here for on-demand re-runs
from the 2009 and 2011 legislative sessions(775) 882-8255
[882-TALK]Barbwire.TV:
15-year overnight success
Daily Sparks Tribune 2-10-2008The Barbwire's Greatest Hits
Highlights from radio days
mp3 file
UPDATE TUESDAY 25 Jan 2011 21:32:03 PST, 05:32:03 1-26-2011 ZULU/GMT/SUT/CUT — On this date in 1787, former revolutionary war officer Daniel Shays led a group of debtors to stop the Massachusetts Supreme Court from meeting and confiscating land and property, attacking both the courthouse and federal arsenal, an uprising that the state militia succeeded in putting down, though the next state legislature granted some of the insurgents‚ demands and pardoned or arranged light sentences for the leaders; in 1892 at Big Creek in Lander County, a snow slide "one of seventeen in the mining area" swept away a blacksmith shop and trapped miners in a mining tunnel (they dug out safely); in 1899 or 1904, John Adam Estes, better known as Sleepy John Estes, blues pioneer and member of the Blues Hall of Fame, was born in Ripley, Tennessee; in 1936, 415 men from two Civilian Conservation Corps camps in Boulder City were given a tour of Hoover Dam and at the Boulder theatre were shown films and slides on the dam construction; in 1938, Square Pegs, one of the first television programs, began airing on the British Broadcasting System; in 1961, Bob Dylan went to Woody Guthrie's house in Queens to meet the folk legend, was twice sent away (Guthrie was in the hospital), and finally was admitted to the house where he met teenaged Arlo; in 1967, Carson City fire official Les Groth reported that the Nevada governor's mansion was filled with fire hazards and in need of structural rehabilitation; in 1988, the first George Bush wrangled live on the air with Dan Rather in a nine-minute exchange that followed a six-minute report on Bush's role in the Iran/Contra scandal, an encounter that Bush later portrayed as the "political equivalent of Iwo Jima," "tension city", "I need combat pay!" (a few days later, Bush came in third in the Iowa caucuses); in 2007, officials of the Google search engine announced on their blog that they had retooled the engine so that typing miserable failure into the search field no longer led to the White House web site's biography of George Bush (the lesser), and critics accused Google of manipulating searches for political reasons.
UPDATE MONDAY 24 Jan 2011 00:04:39 PST, 08:04:39 ZULU/GMT/SUT/CUT — On this date in 41, Roman Emperor Caligula was assassinated by members of the Praetorian Guard and was succeeded by Claudius; in 1879, the Nevada State Journal reported: "Secretary Evarts [U.S. Secretary of State William Evarts] having declared the influx of Chinese to this coast is 'an invasion, not an immigration', it becomes the duty of every good citizen to expel the invaders."; in 1920, the Churchill County Commercial Club adopted a resolution asking Governor Emmet Boyle to call a special session of the Nevada Legislature to pass a law protecting Nevada from the "evils of continued Japanese immigration"; in 1943, facing a hopeless situation after taking horrendous casualties in the battle of Stalingrad, German General Friedrich von Paulus requested permission to surrender and Hitler replied "Surrender is forbidden. 6 Army will hold their positions to the last man and the last round and by their heroic endurance will make an unforgettable contribution towards the establishment of a defensive front and the salvation of the Western world." (by the time Von Paulus surrendered more than a week later, half his force had died); in 1951, the Elko County chamber of commerce, in a ceremony conducted by Newt Crumley, named District Attorney Grant Sawyer as Elko's "man of the year"; in 1965, Mrs. Spencer Tracy, director of a clinic in Los Angeles, wrote to the Las Vegas Review Journal to object to the newspaper's use of the term "deaf mute"; in 1984, Apple Computer introduced the Macintosh; in 1996, ground was broken for the Las Vegas Hilton's Star Trek/The Experience; in 2009, Benedict XVI, in another effort to reach out to the Catholic far right, reinstated four excommunicated bishops, including a Holocaust denier.Franklin Roosevelt memorandum to Cordell Hull/January 24, 1944: I saw Halifax [British ambassador to the United States Edward Wood, Lord Halifax] last week and told him quite frankly that it was perfectly true that I had, for over a year, expressed the opinion that Indo-China should not go back to France but that it should be administered by an international trusteeship. France has had the country — thirty million inhabitants for nearly one hundred years, and the people are worse off than they were at the beginning.
As a matter of interest, I am wholeheartedly supported in this view by Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek [of China] and by Marshal Stalin. I see no reason to play in with the British Foreign Office in this matter. The only reason they seem to oppose it is that they fear the effect it would have on their own possessions and those of the Dutch. They have never liked the idea of trusteeship because it is, in some instances, aimed at future independence. This is true in the case of IndoChina.
Each case must, of course, stand on its own feet, but the case of Indo-China is perfectly clear. France has milked it for one hundred years. The people of IndoChina are entitled to something better than that.
UPDATE SUNDAY 23 Jan 2011 12:01:27 PST, 20:01:27 ZULU/GMT/SUT/CUT — On this date in 1885 in a story datelined from San Francisco, The New York Times reported "The Piute Indians are said to be starving on their barren reservation in Nevada. Not one cent of the Congressional appropriation of $7,000 secured by Senator [Henry] Dawes, of Massachusetts, has reached them. The Winter in Nevada has been a very severe one. The reservation is so barren that nothing could be grown on the land. The Indians number 7,0[?]0. Almost their sole means of subsistence has been pine nuts, fish from Pyramid Lake, and rabbits, latterly the only game on the reservation. Sarah Winnemucca, a member of the tribe, who lecture in the East on the condition fo the Piutes, and who is now spending a few days in this city, says: "My people are utterly destitute, and numbers of them are famishing in the snow."; in 1892, Carson City's Appeal reported "Several beautiful views could have been obtained yesterday from the effect of the pogonip, especially that of the Capitol square"; in 1907, Charles Curtis, later vice-president, became the first Native American U.S. Senator; in 1920, the federal grand jury in Carson City convened to hear 18 cases, including a dozen Chinese opium cases, an instance of a still being operated at Sutro, and a boxcar robbery; in 1941, the U.S. Army Air Corps leased the former Western Air Express airfield from the City of Las Vegas; in 1970, Nevada Governor Paul Laxalt taped a cameo appearance on the CBS situation comedy The Governor and J.J.; in 1970, the Student Affairs Committee of the University of Nevada Reno met on adoption of a student bill of rights; in 1998 in the wake of disclosure of accusations against President Clinton involving White House intern Monica Lewinsky, columnist Ann Coulter said on Geraldo Rivera's CNBC television program that Clinton had also been "serviced" by "four other interns or staff members there", a claim Coulter has never substantiated; in 2008, the Center for Public Integrity issued a report documenting 935 lies told by George Bush, Colin Powell, Richard Cheney, Condoleeza Rice, Donald Rumsfeld and other administration officials between September 11, 2001, and March 2003 in their effort to condition the public to want a war against Iraq (most of the lies were told after Congress had already authorized war in Iraq).
SOS Means Chicken Follytix
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 1-23-2011 Daily Sparks TribuneUPDATE SATURDAY 22 Jan 2011 19:21:57 PST, 03:21:57 23 Jan 2011 ZULU/GMT/SUT/CUT — On this date in 1879, James Shields was appointed by the Missouri Legislature to represent the state in the U.S. Senate after having previously served as a senator from Illinois and Minnesota (though his last appointment was more or less honorary, because he was appointed to serve the remaining weeks in an unexpired term, from January 27 to March 3); in 1892, Carson City's Appeal reported that lynchings exceeded legal hangings in the United States in 1891, 195 to 123; in 1912, the Carson City News published an account of the alleged November 1911 crimes and arrest of Indian Mike and his deaf mute son, contradicting previous published accounts by other newspapers that portrayed the two as bloodthirsty renegades; in 1933, Molotov and Stalin issued an order barring travel from some parts of the Ukraine to prevent information about a government-engineered famine from spreading; in 1940, President Franklin Roosevelt signed an executive order abolishing customs collection district number 48 (Nevada and Utah), revoking Salt Lake City's status as a customs entry point, and putting Nevada and Utah into the same district with San Francisco; in 1957, Decca Records dropped Buddy Holly from its roster of artists while telling him he could not re-record any of his Decca songs with other labels, sending Holly and the Crickets to Brunswick and Coral (their work on Brunswick was released under the Crickets name and on Coral under Holly's name) where they re-recorded a song Decca refused to release: That'll Be the Day, released as a Crickets song, the only number one hit they had under either name; in 1982 in an effort to avoid arms reductions, President Reagan linked arms talks with the Soviet Union to changes in Soviet policy toward Poland; in 2010, The Washington Post disclosed files it obtained under the Freedom of Information Act indicating that broadcast columnist Paul Harvey submitted his scripts to the FBI for approval.
UPDATE TUESDAY 18 Jan 2011 19:22:13 PST, 03:22:13 19 Jan 2011 ZULU/GMT/SUT/CUT —
Meridian Star/Meridian, Mississippi/January 18, 2009: We pause to remember so that we never go back
On this date in 1868, in a denunciation of mining swindles, the Reese River Reveille in Austin, Nevada editorialized "We detest shams. We condemn the thing which appears to be what it is not. Our nose involuntarily turns up at the counterfeit presentment‚ Most of all we dislike — and pity while we dislike — those unhappy women whom nature has cheated of fair proportions, and who find consolation — and husbands — by the ingenious use of cotton and bran; in 1931, Assemblymember Phil Tobin of Humboldt County was reported to have "no bills to present" at the impending Nevada legislature (he ended up introducing the measure that made gambling legal in the state); in 1943, pre-sliced bread was banned in the United States as a wartime measure to conserve steel used in bakery slicer replacement parts; in 1958, a group of Lumbee tribe members, irritated by cross burnings and other white race problems, put participants in a Maxton, North Carolina Ku Klux Klan rally to flight; in 1964, I Want To Hold Your Hand appeared on the Billboard chart for the first time at number 35; in 1969, Vanessa Gower was born in St. Mary's Hospital in Reno; in 1980, Pink Floyd's The Wall reached number one; in 1999, Governor Kenny Guinn proposed using part of Nevada's share of the settlement of lawsuits against the tobacco companies to pay for a new college scholarship program for Nevada high school graduates; in 2003, several hundred people filled Reno's Manzanita Bowl hillside to protest George Bush's impending invasion of Iraq; in 2009, the Meridian Star in Mississippi apologized for "not recording for our readers many of the most important civil rights activities that happened in our midst, including protests and sit-ins. That was wrong. We should have loudly protested segregation and the efforts to block voter registration of black East Mississippians. Current management understands while we can‚t go back and undo some past wrongs, we can offer our sincere apology and promise never again to neglect our responsibility to inform you, our readers, about the human rights and dignity every individual is entitled to in America no matter their religion, their ethnic background or the color of their skin."Updated 1-18-2011: Toljaso — Raggio's boy gets the boss' job
Unions field strong representation at Jan. 17 MLK events
BARBWIRE BREAKING NEWS EXCLUSIVE
Still Sierra Pacific Powerful
No matter whether they call it Reddi Kilowatt, Nevada Power or NV Energy, it's just bright new branding for the same old monopoly rape and pillage — and the latest poll proves it
Time for another initiative petition after 21 years?
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 1-16-2011 Daily Sparks Tribune
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.
HAT TRICK 2010:
Barbwire wins third straight Nevada Press Association first-place award
The 2009 first-place Nevada Press Association award winners
Tony the Tiger & the flaky NFL
Barbwire / 11-30-2008
Deregulation is never having to say you're sorry
Barbwire / 8-3-2008
Nevada: A good place to visit, but do you want to live here?
Barbwire / 6-15-2008
The price of a piece/6-17-2007
Boxing Pandora/9-23-2007
The Lady in the Red Dress
10-28-2007Barbwire.TV
Click here for on-demand re-runs
from the 2009 and 2011 legislative sessions(775) 882-8255
[882-TALK]Barbwire.TV:
15-year overnight success
Daily Sparks Tribune 2-10-2008The Barbwire's Greatest Hits
Highlights from radio days
mp3 fileUPDATE SUNDAY 16 Jan 2011 00:03:07 PST, 08:03:07 ZULU/GMT/SUT/CUT—
On Jan. 16, 1959, Debra Joyce Donlevy and Donna Cline were born.
—> Barbwire 16 January 2011On Jan. 16, 1991, the White House announced the start of Operation Desert Storm to drive Iraqi forces out of Kuwait. — New York Times/AP
Poor Denny's Almanac
Jane Austen/January 16 1796: "At length the day is come on which I am to flirt my last with Tom Lefroy, & when you receive this it will be over. My tears flow as I write, at the melancholy idea."
On this date in 1604 at a conference convened by King James of England, Puritan John Rainolds suggested "May your Majesty be pleased to direct that the Bible be now translated, such versions as are extant not answering to the original."; in 1910, a funeral was held in Reno for auto mechanic James Howard Leason of Schurz: "The death of the young lad, who would have been 13 years of age had he lived until April 10, has been a hard blow to his mother, who worshipped him. Heart trouble had menaced him for years. He was the idol of Schurz folk, few of Schurz's population being white. The Indians loved the child, who was wise beyond his years. And, when the parents left with his body for Reno, every Indian of the town flocked to the train to say some broken word." [EDITOR'S NOTE: Debra Donlevy died in an ambulance passing through Schurz in March, 1978]; in 1936 with the arrival of 200 men from the Overton Civilian Conservation Corps, the Boulder City CCC camp reached 500 men; in 1939, the comic strip version of Superman premiered; in 1942, Soviet Army Major Senitsa Vershovsky was executed by a Nazi Einsatzkommando unit at Kremenchug, Ukraine because he "tried to protect the Jews"; in 1950 during a Reno cab strike, valerian was thrown into eight Whittlesea cabs in Las Vegas, and owner Vic Whittlesea said he suspected it was related to the Reno strike (he owned taxi services in both cities); in 1957, Liverpool's Cavern Club opened; in 1961, the Clark County Hotel Restaurant Employees and Bartenders Association met with its national union executive committee in Las Vegas and the national body agreed to seek repeal of the 10 percent federal cabaret tax which had been lowered from 20 to 10 percent after the war; in 1973, Bonanza, the Sunday evening hour-long western series shot in color with many scenics of Nevada and the Sierra to encourage viewers to buy color television sets, was cancelled after fourteen seasons and after actor Dan Blocker died and NBC quixotically moved the program from Sundays, prime family viewing night; in 1995, an evenly divided session of the Nevada Assembly began with 21 Democratic and 21 Republican members, one Republican speaker and one Democratic speaker, and two chairs for each committee.
UPDATE SATURDAY 15 Jan 2011 3:39:34 p.m. PST, 23:39:34 ZULU/GMT/SUT/CUT — King Day
Martin Luther King, Jr.:
¯From my background I gained my regulating Christian ideals. From Gandhi I learned my operational technique.
¯My wife was always stronger than I was through the struggle.
¯If America‚s soul becomes totally poisoned, part of the autopsy must read Vietnam. It can never be saved so long as it destroys the hopes of men the world over.
¯Laws only declare rights; they do not deliver them. The oppressed must take hold of laws and transform them into effective mandates.
¯We will err and falter as we climb the unfamiliar slopes of steep mountains, but there is no alternative, well-trod, level path.
¯Through violence, you may murder a murderer, but you can‚t murder murder. Through violence, you may murder a liar, but you can‚t establish truth. Through violence you murder a hater, but you can't murder hate.
¯If a man hasn't found something he'll die for, he isn't fit to live.
¯Who are we? We are the descendants of slaves. ... We are the heirs of a past of rope, fire and murder. I for one am not ashamed of this past.
¯A hundred times I have been asked why we have allowed children to march in demonstrations, to freeze and suffer in jails, to be exposed to bullets and dynamite. The answer is simple. Our children and our families are maimed a little every day of their lives. If we can end an incessant torture by a single climactic confrontation, the risks are acceptable.
¯Nonviolent resistance is not a method for cowards; it does resist. If one uses this method because he is afraid or merely because he lacks the instruments of violence, he is not truly nonviolent.
On this date in 1844, the University of Notre Dame du Lac in Indiana was chartered; in 1896, U.S. Representative of Nevada was appointed to a commission to establish the boundary line between Canada and the U.S. and also a committee to inquire into the imprisonment of U.S. Consul to Madagascar John Waller (France conquered Madagascar that year and sentenced Waller to twenty years in prison on grounds that he gave military information to the patriot government to try to prevent the French conquest); in 1929, Michael King was born in Atlanta (when he was five years old, his father would change both their names to honor Martin Luther); in 1936, with many Hoover Dam project workers out of work, Clark County public relief funds were running low; in 1943, Günther Discher, 17 year-old leader of the swingjugend (swing youth, teen fans of jazz and swing who opposed the Nazi regime in Germany), was ordered interned in the Moringen concentration camp because, according to the order "he brings substantial unrest into the population by his subversive and harmful activities"; in 1960, Twilight Zone episode no. 15 I Shot An Arrow Into The Air by Rod Serling, was first broadcast, depicting a space ship crash on an unknown planet in which three astronauts survive, one kills the other two and then discovers he's in Nevada (Serling's closing narrative: "Practical joke perpetrated by Mother Nature and a combination of improbable events. Practical joke wearing the trappings of nightmare, of terror, of desperation. Small human drama played out in a desert ninety-seven miles from Reno, Nevada, U.S.A., continent of North America, the Earth, and of course, the Twilight Zone"); in 1978, tyrant Reza Pahlavi fled Iran an hour ahead of the posse; in 1990, Luke Alan Olsen was born in Reno; in 1996, Tommy Rettig, "Jeff Miller" in the first Lassie television series, an actor in numerous movies, and later a computer software engineer, died in Marina del Rey (in 1990, Rettig wrote one of the episodes of The New Lassie, about Lassie learning to use a computer); in 2005, during a morning news program on KTNV in Las Vegas, weather reporter Rob Blair referred to "Martin Luther Coon King" and (in an apology for the first reference) "Martin Luther Kong Jr.", prompting a workforce threat of a walkout (Blair was fired the next day).UPDATE FRIDAY 14 Jan 2011 00:17:31 PST, 08:17:31 ZULU/GMT/SUT/CUT — On this date in 1697, Samuel Sewell, one of nine judges in the Salem witch trials, admitted error and apologized, saying he "...Desires to take the Blame & Shame of it, Asking pardon of men, And especially desiring prayers that God who has an Unlimited Authority, would pardon that Sin", and he became a pariah among community leaders (other participants had apologized, but Sewell was the first not to make excuses); in 1892, Hollywood producer Hal Roach (who would film One Million B.C. in Nevada's Valley of Fire) was born in Elmira, New York; in 1917, James McMillan, who would become a leading African American figure in Nevada history, was born in Mississippi; in 1920, former French finance minister Joseph Caillaux, arrested in 1917 on treason charges for opposing France's entry into the world war, was finally put on trial more than a year after the war ended (he was convicted only of corresponding with Germans, exiled and stripped of his civil rights for ten years, amnestied, served twice more as finance minister, and refused to serve in the Vichy government); in 1920, an official of the Nevada Valleys Power Company said construction of a power generator on the Truckee River at the McCarran Ranch would begin within the next few weeks; in 1936, Desiree Worder of Redwood City obtained a Reno divorce from William Worder so she could marry Roy Burnett, Jr., and Burnett's wife Gladys could marry Mr.Worder; in 1946, U.S. Senator Edward Carville of Nevada said he would sponsor legislation making twelve months of peacetime military training compulsory for every citizen (he didn't say so but presumably he meant only men); in 1954, Marilyn married Joltin' Joe at San Francisco city hall; in 1970 at the Frontier casino hotel in Las Vegas, the Supremes performed together for the last time; in 2008, Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama campaigned in Carson City shortly before the Nevada caucuses.
UPDATE THURSDAY 13 Jan 2011 00:02:30 PST, 08:02:30 ZULU/GMT/SUT/CUT —
Emile Zola/J'accuse/L'Aurore/January 13, 1898: Since they have dared, I shall dare: I do not despair in the least of ultimate triumph. I repeat with more intense conviction: the truth is on the march and nothing will stop it.
On this date in 1842, William Brydon arrived at Jalalabad, the only survivor of a contingent of 4,500 British soldiers and 12,000 aides and camp followers wiped out by Afghan patriot forces during British aggression against Kabul; in 1891, a month after the killing of Sitting Bull and two weeks after the massacre at Wounded Knee Creek, Nevada whites were being freaked out by large gatherings of Nevada tribes in Elko and Austin, by Piutes and Bannocks reportedly meeting, and by a dancing ground for the ghost dance near Deeth (the Elko county sheriff reportedly wired Governor Colcord for arms); in 1898 in an effort to invite legal action against himself and get the Dreyfuss case into court, Emile Zola published J'accuse on page one of L'Aurore; in 1931, the will of the late Clark Alvord, postmaster and storekeeper in tiny Nelson, Nevada left 55 percent of his estate (including more than a half million shares of mining stock) to movie star Marion Davies, who he had seen on screen in a Las Vegas theatre; in 1940, Mexican President Lazaro Cardenas joined other Latin American leaders in saying the Monroe "doctrine" does not legally exist, that it is a pretext for U.S. intervention in the affairs of the region and a unilateral expression of U.S. interests; in 1944, staffers at the U.S. Treasury delivered to Treasury Secretary Henry Morgenthau a Report to the Secretary on the Acquiescence of This Government in the Murder of the Jews, which Morgenthau passed along to President Roosevelt, threatening to resign unless FDR removed authority over the matter from the State Department (Roosevelt established a War Refugees Board to take over handling of the issue); in 1960 when stepping out of a cab in New York City, blacklisted actor Zero Mostel was hit by a crosstown bus, crushing his leg and prompting doctors to recommend amputation, which he refused to permit because it would have ended his already damaged career, and in a lengthy hospitalization he avoided gangrene to go on to career recovery and comeback; in 1982, an Air Florida Boeing 737 that had just taken off from National Airport in one of the worst blizzards in D.C. history came in low over the Potomac River, hit the 14th Street bridge, sliced the top off several cars, and crashed through thick ice into the river (the riverbank quickly became lined with passersby and one of them, 28 year-old public employee Lenny Skutnik, became a national hero when he plunged into the river and rescued stewardess Kelly Dunan, who had been foundering in the river, unable to hold on to a rope lowered to her by a helicopter); in 1998, the Catholic newspaper in France, La Croix, apologized for its antisemitism one hundred years earlier during the Dreyfuss matter.
UPDATE WEDNESDAY 1-12-2011 15:34:20 PST, 23:34:20 ZULU/GMT/SUT/CUT — On this date in 1877 at Nevada's Leviathan mine, miners were being compelled to work ten hours a day, and workmen above ground were expected to put in twelve hours for the wages of $4, and it was expected that other mines would follow the Leviathan's example; in 1901, Phillippine "governor" William Howard Taft was considering whether to allow Filipinos to have freedom of religion; in 1908, a commission appointed by President Roosevelt to investigate the labor situation in Goldfield, Nevada, into which he had sent federal troops, reported that businesspeople and the governor in Nevada had manipulated Roosevelt into using the troops to break the mining unions (the Washington Post headline was "TROOPS TO COERCE"); in 1935, Louis Piquet, John Dillinger's attorney, got a break in his trial on charges of harboring the gangster when U.S. District Judge William Holly ruled "It is not required of a lawyer to surrender his client or to inform law agencies."; in 1942, President Rooseveltsigned executive order 9019 closing Nevada land to the public and reserving its use to the War Department for an aerial machine gun range, and executive order 9020 transferring control of the Tonopah airport to the War Department; in 1954, U.S. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles announced that the Eisenhower administration would follow a policy of "deterrent of massive retaliatory power" in working its will, a policy that — as the U.S. and the Soviet Union improved their nuclear delivery systems — led to "mutually assured destruction" (MAD); in 1957, actress Jean Peters married billionaire Howard Hughes at the L & L Motel in Tonopah, Nevada, reportedly in room 33; in 1960, Reno Mayor Bud Baker said he would continue working to turn the downtown‚s casino district into a mall, proposing that the idea be tried on major holidays and then, if it worked, made permanent on Memorial Day; in 1966, the U.S. got a better sense of the meaning of camp with the debut of the television series Batman, which quickly became a huge (though short lived) hit with some of the biggest stars in the nation lining up for a chance to guest star (the show had an unusual schedule, airing twice a week on Tuesdays and Thursdays); in 1991 in a vote on authorizing use of force by the first George Bush, the U.S. Senate came within three votes of preventing war in the Persian Gulf; in 1998, Gene Vincent, Lloyd Price, Allen Toussaint, Jelly Roll Morton, the Mamas and the Papas, Santana, the Eagles and Fleetwood Mac were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
Billy Brawl: Raggio Resigns
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 1-9-2011 Daily Sparks Tribune
The Lady in the Red Dress
The Barbwire's classic Nevada Day column written in 1983
The compleat history of the Silver State in 500 words
SO WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE?
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Political Animal Crackers & Crackups
"I think it is dangerous to confuse the idea of democracy with elections. Just because you have elections doesn't mean you are a democracy...I'm still taken aback at the extent of indoctrination and propaganda in the United States. It is as if people there are being reared in a sort of altered reality, like broiler chickens or pigs in a pen."
— Indian novelist Arundhati Roy
in the Barbwire of 9-12-2004
The American electorate is a dumb cow that follows the herd, is easily stampeded, gets milked for all she's worth and produces offspring for meat, muscle or cannon fodder to benefit the few. When all used up, she is sent to the slaughterhouse so that she may give her overlords the last full measure of devotion, bones for Jello and hide for belts. No stars and stripes for her grave because she doesn't merit one, having been totally consumed by our consumptive system. — Barbwire 9-12-2010"If elections mattered, they wouldn't let us do it." — Travus T. Hipp, 1982
Great Minds Think Alike Dept.
Over-rated New York Times Pulitzer over-achiever Thomas Friedman predicts emergence of a third political party a month after the Barbwire did so for the umpteenth time (He's just one short.)
Paul Krugman: Murdoch as Citizen Kane / GOP candidates paid off by Faux News
New York Times 10-3-2001NEWS BULLETIN & ALMANIACAL ARCHIVES
Also see NevadaLabor.com's Statewide U-News Roundup
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