BARBWIRE by ANDREW BARBANO

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Irony cards, cat houses and catty censorship
Expanded from the 11-13-2011 Daily Sparks Tribune
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Everybody knows the dice are loaded. Everybody rolls with their fingers crossed.    Everybody knows the war is over. Everybody knows the good guys lost.    Everybody knows the fight was fixed. The poor stay poor, the rich get rich.    That's how it goes. Everybody knows.

— Leonard Cohen

HAT TRICK: Barbwire wins 3rd straight Nevada Press Association First-Place Award Barbwire.TV Watch NevadaLabor.com for show times. Help us get the word out. Support the project at http://resurge.tv#donate SUING FOR SCHOOLS Updated 8-30-2011 Now rerunning on Carson-Dayton 226 Additional programs on Boulder City cable. Go to bcnv.org and then go to the BCTV link. If Reform Fails: Health Care, Jobs and Unions — new power to the people on the public airwaves The program premiers were available to every television set in the region because of a high-mileage media hybrid. The shows appeared on both commercial and community stations. The non-corporate entity produced the events, commercial TV greatly expanded distribution. Thus began an ongoing series of sane public interest programs which generate both entertaining heat and more than a little light. Please spread the word and consider contributing to the cause online at ReSurge.TV. You may also take the public option known as the U.S. Postal Service and send a check or money order to ReSurge.TV, P.O. Box 10034, Reno NV 89510. Your contribution will help fund the distribution as well as ongoing efforts at developing new media, including a regional, non-corporate community radio station and the return of community television to Reno-Sparks-Washoe. You are present at the creation of what I hope can become a new media model where the programming accurately reflects what's happening on the ground and the media impact is powerful enough to forcefully pass the message upward. Thanks. Be well. Raise hell. Andrew Click here for selected on-demand re-runs from the 2009, 2010 and 2011 Barbwire.TV archives Barbwire.TV: 15-year overnight success Daily Sparks Tribune 2-10-2008 The Barbwire's Greatest Hits Highlights from radio days mp3 file HAT TRICK: Barbwire wins 3rd straight Nevada Press Association First-Place Award

Some people find it OK to screw over anybody they don't know. Bring it home and it magically morphs into a different story.

Years ago, Big John Miller, late editor of the Carson City Nevada Appeal, wrote a column completely reversing his longstanding opposition to the Equal Rights Amendment. It was fine in the abstract, but not when he thought about discrimination against his young daughter.

A few years back, a picturebook couple moved next door to me. He was a UNR medical student, she a beautiful young mother.

One day, the doctor-in-waiting knocked on my door and asked me to sign an anti-gay marriage petition, a rank piece of hateful bigotry now ensconced in the Nevada Constitution.

I felt a twinge. Should this man become a doctor if he considers a white hood an acceptable accessory to his white coat? Could he be counted on to provide objective medical care to someone he considers subhuman in the rights department?

For two reasons, I chose not to argue with him.

First, it was apparent that he would have a very large family. He had three children and I heard a fourth was on the way soon after he left for his internship.

The more babies, the higher the odds that one or more would be of alternative procreative proclivity. LIke Big John, the young doctor could soon see his own prejudice knocking at his door, oppressing his own family.

God, the eternal comedian, frequently plays such irony cards in the big game called life.

I instead used the opportunity to lecture him on my one-step cure for the ills of society: broadly-based economic opportunity.

I cited Timothy McVeigh as an example. If the late Oklahoma City bomber had a good job waiting for him after his beloved army mustered him out, might he have been less likely to get into freelance bomb making?

The Arab Spring sweeping Africa and Asia has much in common with our domestic Occupadista Guerrillas. The kids just want a fair chance to achieve a fair share.

The beauty of these bottom-up revolutions lies in their decentralization. Ask anybody who's in charge and the answer is "whoever your talking to." They present the ultimate moving target and confound conservatives who insist that the way things have always been is how they must always be.

Lord, have mercy! They be bastard children because they have neither think tank nor political action committee to lend them legitimacy. Some are homeless students so irresponsible that they will be burdened with college loan debt for the rest of their lives.

Lush Rambo recently called them human debris. Small minds think alike. In his first campaign, former Reno mayor Jeff Griffin termed the homeless as human debris, echoing the corpulent copious capsule consumer contaminating the public airwaves. Limbaugh became a national figure in part by trashing Reno homeless people in 1988.

Some of said human debris will demonstrate in downtown Reno this Thursday, gathering at 9:45 a.m. in the Mapes Hotel graveyard created by Griffin's ego in front of the black tower called city hall.

Local workers have invited Occupadistas to march from the Mapes scar to the nearby Virginia Street Bridge, part of nationwide demonstrations to convince Congress to fund infrastructure. The crumbling centenarian span is a flood hazard in sore need of replacement. Kinda like our unfair economy.

Irony cards, anyone?

JOE CONFORTE DEPT. Johnny Carson's favorite network censor, Miss Priscilla Goodbody, has apparently come out of retirement at the Reno airport. The bluenoses have banned Joe Conforte's autobiography from the airport bookstore.

Co-author David Toll said the issue first was a painting of a woman's shapely tush behind Conforte in the cover photo. After Toll suggested stickers to cover the drawings, Miss Goodbody objected to the title, Breaks, Brains & Balls: The Story of Nevada's Fabulous Mustang Ranch.

TRICS ARE NOT FOR KIDS. Joe's having a pretty good week on the publicity front. It looks like Storey County is going to close Lance Gilman's Wild Horse Brothel, a sister operation to Conforte's fabled Mustang Ranch, which Gilman acquired in a federal bankruptcy auction. Gilman is best known as developer of the Tahoe-Reno Industrial Center, or TRIC for short.

GOODBODY, PART DEUX. The censorship flap reminds me of legendary photographer Don Dondero's dustup with Sundance Books. (Barbwire 8-23-1992) The booksellers banned Dondero's Dateline Reno because they didn't like a mild comment about Mrs. Bing Crosby not gaining a lot of weight during pregnancy.

NOT GOODBYE. 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.

NOT A PEEP. Apparently Sparks City Hall has found no flaw in Tribune reportage about Lowe's closing its Oddie Blvd. store when its new location at the publicly subsidized Marina is ready. City officials lied about being unaware.

U-TUBE. Check the expanded web edition of this column at NevadaLabor.com for the latest statewide Barbwire.TV schedule, viewable 24/7 online.

Support the return of community radio and television in these parts. Go to ReSurge.TV to volunteer your time or treasure or both.

It's now more important than ever — > unless you think corporate-controlled media is all you need. Stay tuned for updates.

Be well. Raise hell.
______

Andrew Barbano is a 43-year Nevadan, chair of the Nevada César Chávez Committee, producer of Nevada's annual César Chávez Day celebration, first vice-president and political action chair of the Reno-Sparks NAACP, labor/consumer/civil rights advocate, member of Communications Workers of America Local 9413/AFL-CIO and editor of NevadaLabor.com. As always, his opinions are strictly his own. Check local listings for other Nevada cable systems. E-mail barbano@frontpage.reno.nv.us. Barbwire by Barbano has originated in the Daily Sparks Tribune since 1988.

Smoking Guns POWERFUL PUNDITORY PANJANDRUMS: Compelling guest commentary Nevada Press Assn. annual award winners announced. HAT TRICK: Barbwire takes first place for third year in a row. The winning entries: Suing for Schools: The 20-year shuck Expanded from the 2-21-2010 Daily Sparks Tribune Click here to view the show on your desktop RED flags flying low over Sparks Expanded from the 1-10-2010 Daily Sparks Tribune The wrath of self-righteous racism Expanded from the 11-8-2009 Daily Sparks Tribune Government contacts Nev. congressional delegation Nevada Legislature State of Nevada Secretary of State Carson City Clark County City of Las Vegas Douglas County Reno City Council Sparks City Council Washoe County Commission Washoe Registrar of Voters The campaign against forcibly-paid newspaper obituaries And they wonder why the newspaper business is dying?   The Dean's List    The Dean of Reno Bloggers could very well be Andrew Barbano, self-described "fighter of public demons," who started putting his "Barbwire" columns online in 1996 and now runs 10 sites. RENO NEWS & REVIEW, 11-9-2006 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 2008 first-place Nevada Press Association award winners The price of a piece / 6-17-2007 Boxing Pandora /9-23-2007 The Lady in the Red Dress 10-28-2007 1997 Pulitzer Prize entries ...and more ammo Fact-free nation: Inside the lie machine Mother Jones Magazine May-June 2011 / Cover story and in-depth analysis Bill Moyers: Welcome to the Plutocracy Money fights hard and it fights dirty Speech delivered at Boston University on 29 Oct. 2010 Part of the Howard Zinn Lecture Series Barbwire Corporate Welfare Archive Cabellyup.com From clear-cut forests to dirty Gulfstream waters, this land belongs to old BP TOLJASO LONG TIME AGO BP/ARCO: The greasy root of our evils Barbwire / Daily Sparks Tribune 9-10-2006 The awful truth — Read it and weep, fellow suckers Labor Day 2009: Rise of the Vampire Corpobots Expanded from the 9-6-2009 Daily Sparks Tribune Angry Americans and Freudian fraud Using war to market cigarettes Expanded from the 8-23-2009 Daily Sparks Tribune BARBWIRE Nevada Corporate Welfare Archive Propaganda fuels gasoline price fixing Barbwire 8-14-2005 Donate to the cable ratepayer legal defense fund at our PayPal-enabled ReSurge.TV Consumer War Room Phillips, Kevin; Numbers Racket: Why the economy is worse than we know Harper's Magazine; May 2008; page 43 Phillips has authored numerous books on history and politics over the past 40 years. His most recent, Bad Money: Reckless Finance, Failed Politics and the Global Crisis of American Capitalism, was published by Viking on April 15, 2008. NAOMI WOLF: Fascist America in 10 Easy Steps There are some things common to every state that's made the transition to fascism. Author Naomi Wolf argues that all of them are present in America today. Alternet 5-20-2007 Johnson, Chalmers; REPUBLIC OR EMPIRE? A National Intelligence Estimate on the United States; Harper's magazine; January, 2007. I love it when heavy hitters validate what I've been saying for years in the tiny Sparks Tribune. Barlett, Donald L. and Steele, James B.; America: What Went Wrong? (1992); America: Who Really Pays the Taxes? (1994); America: Who Stole the Dream? (1996) ; Andrews & McMeel/Universal Press Syndicate. Review of Alex Carey's Taking the Risk Out of Democracy: Propaganda in the US and Australia The Orwell Diversion by Alex Carey Excerpted from the book available below ORDER Taking the Risk Out of Democracy Corporate Propaganda versus Freedom and Liberty By Alex Carey Edited by Andrew Lohrey Foreword by Noam Chomsky University of Illinois Press      SEE ALSO: Lapham, Lewis H.; Tentacles of Rage: The Republican Propaganda Mill, A Brief History; Harper's Magazine cover article; September, 2004, page 32.      By one conservative estimate, the corporate right has spent about $3 billion over the past three decades manufacturing public opinion to suit big business goals. Lapham's number covered the early 1970's to the present day. Alex Carey noted that by 1948, anti- New Deal corporate propaganda expenditures had already reached $100 million per year, not adjusted for inflation, for advertising alone. (Carey, ibid; page 79)      Adjusted for inflation, that 1948 $100 million becomes $801,659,751.04 in 2005 dollars. Conservatives Help Wal-Mart, and Vice Versa As Wal-Mart struggles to rebut growing criticism, it has discovered a reliable ally: conservative research groups. New York Times 9-8-2006; Free registration may be required.       BARBWIRE: Labor Day '94: People vs. corporate con job, 9-4-94 Chilling forecasts from Alex Carey       BARBWIRE: The Nevada Republican Party Becomes Communist, 3-30-97 A prescient Plato on the dangers of oligarchy The sands of time do not cloud the long memories of the sheiks of Araby Barbwire 9-10-2006       Rinfret, Pierre A.; Peace is Bullish; Look magazine, 5-31-1966

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Copyright © 1982-2011 Andrew Barbano

Andrew Barbano is a 43-year Nevadan, editor of NevadaLabor.com and JoeNeal.org; and former chair of the City of Reno's Citizens Cable Compliance Committee, He is producer of Nevada's annual César Chávez Day celebration and serves as first vice-president, political action chair and webmaster of the Reno-Sparks NAACP. As always, his opinions are strictly his own. E-mail barbano@frontpage.reno.nv.us.

Barbwire by Barbano premiered in the Daily Sparks (Nev.) Tribune on Aug. 12, 1988, and has originated in those parts ever since. Tempus fugit.

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