BARBWIRE
by
ANDREW BARBANO
Pirate Laureate of the High Desert Outback of the American Dream
The Barbwire Molly Ivins Memorial Columniator Hall of Flames
Now including Dennis Myers and Don Dondero


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SITE NAVIGATION TIPS: When all else fails, read the instructions (A favorite John Hanks aphorism I've been using for decades)

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

TRUMP URGES UNITY VS. RACISM
New York Times front page headline 8-6-2019
BARBWIRE TRANSLATION: "You provide the unity, I'll provide the racism"

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

An Alternative National Anthem

   Everybody knows the dice are loaded.
Everybody rolls with their fingers crossed.
   Everybody knows the war is over.
Everybody knows the good guys lost.
   Everybody knows the fight was fixed.
The poor stay poor, the rich get rich.
   That's how it goes.
Everybody knows.

   Everybody knows that the boat is leaking.
Everybody knows that the captain lied.
   Everybody got this broken feeling
Like their father or their dog just died.
   Everybody talking to their pockets.
Everybody wants a box of chocolates
   And a long red rose.
Everybody knows.

   Everybody knows that you love me, baby.
Everybody knows you really do.
   Everybody knows that you've been faithful,
Give or take a time or two.
   Everybody knows you've been discreet
But there were so many people you just had to meet
   Without your clothes.
Everybody knows.

   Everybody knows that it's now or never.
Everybody knows that it's me or you.
   And everybody knows that you live forever
When you've done a line or two.
   Everybody knows the deal is rotten
Old Black Joe's still pickin' cotton
   For your ribbons and bows
And everybody knows.

   Everybody knows that the plague is coming.
Everybody knows that it's moving fast.
   Everybody knows that the naked man and woman —
Just a shining artifact of the past.
   Everybody knows the scene is dead
But there's gonna be a meter on your bed
   That will disclose
What everybody knows.

   And everybody knows that you're in trouble.
Everybody knows what you've been through
   From the bloody cross on top of Calvary
To the beach at Malibu.
   Everybody knows it's coming apart.
Take one last look at this Sacred Heart
   Before it blows.
And everybody knows.

Everybody knows. Everybody knows.
   That's how it goes. Everybody knows.


By Leonard Cohen and Sharon Robinson.
© 1988 CBS Records, Inc.

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


Bernie or bust, Dolores a must
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 2-26-2020 Sparks Tribune / Updated 2-27 and 3-26-2020 GMT / Expansions in blue


Greatest Hits Dept.

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

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and Jake Highton and Dennis Myers next.

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10 the Hard Way
Barbwire wins 10th Nevada Press Association award

GOLD 2017-18

2018 First-Place Winners

From the depths of despair to the den of iniquity & holy of holies

"Excellent work. These are some of the most moving columns I've read."
— NPA contest judge/9-29-201
8

The Grasshopper and
the Dragonfly

9-6-2017

Kicked off the Ledge
4-18-2017

NATIONAL NEWS FIRST-BREAK
Back to the Future in
Mississippi West Nevada

10-18-2017

Gold 2017
Don't ask Renown Med for marijuana to help your chemo

10-4-2016
We Don't Need No Education
Toxic turf threat ignored

12-13-2016
Kate Smith & Lady Gaga
2-14-2017

Bronze 6-pack
In the Uber-Nevada legislature, words can kill
4-28-2015
On artificial turf, don't breathe unless absolutely necessary (above)
11-24-2015
Leading questions, lead-headed leaders
1-19-2016

Hopelessly trying to win an earthquake
4-18-2013
2013 Loony Tunes Legislative Lexicon
5-30-2013
The politics of media ga-ga boosterism
3-20-2014

More statewide and national award winners

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

1997 Pulitzer Prize entries

Barbwire.TV:
15-year overnight success

Daily Sparks Tribune 2-10-2008

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

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

Tomorrow's news today —> Subscribe to Barbwire Confidential
TOP SECRET— HushHush!

 

The impervious cycles of American history predicted a 2016 Republican victory as I wrote on February 16 of that year.

They likewise predict a Democratic win this November.

As the old saying goes, Democrats don't win elections, Republicans lose them. The Elephantines are well on their way. But the capacity for snatching defeat from the jaws of victory is hard-wired into Donkeykong DNA.

Corporate America and Czar Vladimir are now ganging up on Sen. Bernie Sanders who slam-dunked Nevada last week. I was appalled to see a seasoned campaign manager like James Carville say on Monday that the Russians want Bernie in November. Nonsense. As I wrote last week, they want Pete Buttigieg who breaks the Democratic base with fundamentalist African-Americans, Latinos and Republican union members.

Worse, if Democratic cowards begin to subvert Bernie as they did when they rigged the primaries in 2016, Bernie's base will walk and not show up in November, as many did not four years ago. Had the Green Party not screwed up and failed to make the Nevada ballot, I would have voted for Jill Stein instead of Hillary.

Baby steps toward equity and equality don't work. Delay is the devil and serves the overlords of power.

Donald Trump is political Teflon because he has attained rogue folk hero status. The only folk hero the Democrats have is Bernie and he's a better one, an honorable one whose basic principles have been the same for decades, invulnerable. (That's why I like retired Sen. Joe Neal, D-North Las Vegas.)

From my talk radio days, I know that the best way to start a fire on the air is to say the magic word "insurance." Everybody has a gripe about their insurance company. The idea that you will feel incredible anguish should Medicare for All divorce you from your hallowed co-dependency with your insurance conglomerate is one of the great pieces of successful corporate propaganda.

Bernie's America's best and perhaps last shot at maintaining a representative democracy. Otherwise, start watching the news on how the in-name-only democracies of Russia, Turkey, Poland, Hungary, Venezuela, Egypt and the Philippines operate.

It can't happen here? It's already in the White House waiting to morph into its true self: Dictatorship.

CONFUSION JUNCTION: SCHOOL DISTRICT BIZ AS USUAL. Two Washoe school board members just announced they would not seek re-election and that's by no means the biggest news out of the 9th Street Green Monster.

The school board could have put the elongated Hug High School re-naming fight to rest last November but chose bureaucratic chaos instead. Four votes were announced for former Reno-Sparks NAACP president and matriarch Dolores Feemster. Instead, thru pure bureaucratic manipulation, the board flipped the matter back to its naming committee for more review.

They thus pitted the Feemster family against that of late State Sen. Debbie Smith, D-Sparks, folks who have long loved each other. The committee did not issue a split decision on Feb. 5, opting to recommend only Sen. Smith when Hug is re-tooled as a tech school. This despite a compromise discussed in November: Hug for Feemster, and AACT for Smith. (The alphabet soup describes the current Academy of Art Careers & Technology in Reno.)

That was just too easy. Now, the school board stands accused of conflicts of interest and breaking the open meeting law.

Adrienne Feemster, one of Dolores' many grandchildren, has filed charges both with district staff and the Nevada Attorney General. Details with the expanded Barbwire web edition at NevadaLabor.com/

A vote on the Hug renaming has thus been bumped from this week to March 31. Which means I'm gonna have a busy day. That's César Chávez Day at which former Tribunite Dennis Myers will be the first Nevada journalist inducted into the César Chávez Nevada Labor Hall of Fame.

When it rains, it pours. Stay tuned. [UPDATE: The school re-naming does not appear on the March 31 school board agenda and the César Chávez event has been moved to May 30.]

HAPPENING WEDNESDAY AT RENO CITY HALL. The city council will commemorate National Eating Disorders Awareness Week with a proclamation and a preview of the locally produced, double-Telly Award-winning documentary "Love, Chantal" about Reno High graduate Chantal Hager who lost her life to the disease. You may view the proceedings on the city's cable channel at Charter/Spectrum 194 (+ reruns) or thereabouts. (The City of Reno's second cable channel, the former 1991-2000 Sierra Nevada Community Access TV channel lies at Charter/Spectrum 192.) Also streaming at Reno.Gov and archived at YouTube. Monitor ChantalCoalition.org for ongoing community outreach updates.

The council will also vote on a $1,000 contribution to the Reno-Sparks NAACP's health and environmental justice program, facilitated by councillors Neoma Jardon and Devon Reese.

IT HAPPENED AT SAVEMART (a good union shop, of course): I could not resist giving the young man behind me in the checkout line a little Valentine's Day advice. He was purchasing just two items, a beautiful bouquet of fresh flowers.

And a bag of Cheetos.

"Sir, I compliment you on your obviously good intentions, but your choice of romantic dinner menu needs a little work.

SAVE THE DATE — MARCH 31: César Chávez XVIII, Atlantis Resort. Sponsored by Laborers' Union Local 169, the Reno-Sparks NAACP and the usual suspects. Doors open 5:30, dinner 6:30-ish. I don't know how I'll top my greatest hits of a cherried-out Aretha Franklin 1965 pink Cadillac convertible (with suitable live music) followed by Nevada Gov. Steve Sisolak with suitable politics, but I'm working on it. Reservations at CesarChavezNevada.com/ [UPDATE: The César Chávez event has been moved to May 30.]

Be well. Raise hell. Esté bien. Haga infierno. (Pardon my Spanglish.)
être bien, élever l'enfer (And my French.)
Stammi bene. Scatenare l'inferno. (And Italian.)

¡Sí se puede!
__________________

Andrew Barbano is a 51-year Nevadan, executive producer of Nevada's annual César Chávez Day celebration, first vice-president and political action chair of the Reno-Sparks NAACP, superannuated labor/consumer/civil rights advocate, member of Communications Workers of America Local 9413/AFL-CIO and editor of NevadaLabor.com and BallotBoxing.US and SenJoeNeal.org and DoctorLawyerWatch.com and Protect Our Washoe.org and ChantalCoalition.org/ He is a withdrawn-in-good-standing member of Culinary Local 226. As always, his opinions are strictly his own. E-mail barbano@frontpage.reno.nv.us. He has lived in both northern and southern Nevada during his half-century+ in the Silver State. Barbwire by Barbano has originated in the Sparks Tribune since 1988 and received its 10th Nevada Press Association award (6 of 10 first-place) at the 21 Sept. 2019 NPA annual convention in Ely. In 1996, he was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize for a six-month investigative series. His multi-media road construction zone safety campaign for Laborers' Union Local 169 won a first-place award from the National Safety Council in a nationwide competition. (Such ephemera and about six bucks will get you a Latte Mocha Cotsafracas Chingade at just about any Starbux worldwide, guaranteed.) His work has appeared on CNN, in The New York Times, The Guardian of London/UK and more important publications.

WEB XTRAS & SMOKING GUNS —>

Veni, Vidi, Jockocracy?
Locker room rules: Caesars goes commando, union vows resistance to Eldorado empire

By Bryan Horwath / Las Vegas Sun 6-28-2019 / Reno Gazette-Journal 7-8-2019

Eldorado-Caesars merger means labor union battles far beyond Reno & Las Vegas
Culinary Union leader D. Taylor: "Where are they going to cut?"

Building trade union campaigns continue

By Ed Komenda / Reno Gazette-Journal / 6-27-2019

[4-20-2019] — About 100 demonstrators from almost all the region's unions, local community service organizations and political activists joined Culinary Union members picketing Circus Circus in the late afternoon of April 18. A couple of CC suits came out to see what all the fuss was about, as if they didn't already know. In addition to the familiar union "contract now!" chants came calls for a strike against the Carano jocks. ¡Viva Huelga! ¡Sí se puede!

REAL NEWS DEPT. In January 2019, Culinary Union Local 226 defeated an attempt by Circus Circus-Reno to decertify (terminate) the union's representation of its workers. No word on whether management plans to appeal the result to the National Labor Relations Board which was recently put out of business for 35 days. Thank you, Czar Donaldov.

CONSUMER CONUNDRUMS: PINK SLIPS, PURGES AND PRUNING. I need to hear from recently purged Eldorado Hotel-Casino, Circus Circus-Reno and Silver Legacy employees. Barbwire spies report perhaps 100 workers got the ax just in time for the 2018 holidays. In the Tribune, at Barbwire.US and in the London Guardian, I have lamented the deepening desperation of renters here in Tesla Valhalla. I'm now getting complaints about medical and dental practices purportedly pruning their patient loads, cutting loose the less-lucrative. That's de facto malpractice but medical professionals are lawsuit-proof under Nevada law — unless you're rich enough to personally pay a few hundred grand in legal fees. That's why TV lawyers only advertise for arrest or accident cases these days. If you've been cast adrift by patient pruning, call me at (775) 882-TALK or e-mail me.


Peruse the Underbelly of the News —> Subscribe to Barbwire Confidential

For all the news you never knew you needed to know 'til now: Tell your friends and friendly enemies to subscribe to Barbwire Confidential for warm laughter, cheap thrills, hot scoops and occasional cold logic at BallotBoxing.US/ Cheap at twice the price. (Hush Hush!)

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

Smoking Guns—>

Czars Donaldov & Nixon win Democratic Caucus
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 2-19-2020 Sparks Tribune

Springtime for fat cats & unburied hatchets
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 2-12-2020 Sparks Tribune

Love saves a life on Reno's mean streets
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 2-5-2020 Sparks Tribune

Bill Harrah's cookie cutter crumbles
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 1-29-2020 Sparks Tribune

Going to confession with Father Barbwire
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 1-22-2020 Sparks Tribune

National welfare, corporate welfare and MLK
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 1-15-2020 Sparks Tribune

The New Jim Crow — Nothing New
By Michelle Alexander / New York Times January 17 & 19, 2020
Printable Text Version

The only way to stop killing is to stop killing
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 1-8-2020 Sparks Tribune


Barbano sells out to white Republicans

Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 1-1-2020 Sparks Tribune

The Sermon on Mount Barbwire
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno /
Expanded from the 12-25-2019 Sparks Tribune
Typhoid Mary infects Sparks Addams Family
In the spirit of true democracy which provides that your rights don't allow you to sneeze on mine
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 12-18-2019 Sparks Tribune
A fake news fable for our times
In the spirit of true democracy which provides that your rights don't allow you to sneeze on mine
Barbwire Confidential by Andrew Barbáno
/ 12-11-2019 Online Edition
Red-flag warnings — Ignoring history at our peril
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 12-11-2019 Sparks Tribune
Major rent raunch and a big book launch
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 12-4-2019 Sparks Tribune

Billionaire Tom Steyer owes me $5
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 11-27-2019 Sparks Tribune

Back to the future down Amnesia Lane
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 11-20-2019 Sparks Tribune

People get ready, that train's a comin'
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Special Barbwire Confidential Internet Edition 11-12-2019 / Updated 11-14 & 11-15-2019
A version of this column appeared in the 11-13-2019 Sparks Tribune
An excerpt of the following was included in Andrew Barbano's address to the school board on Nov. 12.

SPECIAL REPORT FROM THE SCENE OF THE CRIME: Clever maneuvering prevents vote after 4 of 7 trustees announced support for Feemster.

DO NOT risk your kids at Golden Eagle Park
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 11-6-2019 Sparks Tribune

Tale of 2 city halls: Cancer kids & brain damage
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 10-30-2019 Sparks Tribune

Written in the stars: UNR football for racial justice
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 10-23-2019 Sparks Tribune

Goodbye, Columbus: A mirror for America
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 10-16-2019 Sparks Tribune

Déjà vu all over again: Bernie turns 2020 into 1968
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 10-9-2019 Sparks Tribune

City of Reno turns W. Plumb Lane into horny street
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 10-2-2019 Sparks Tribune

Hip-hopping mad over molesters and Mad Kings
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 9-25-2019 Sparks Tribune

Trade the Confederacy straight across for Greenland
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 9-18-2019 Sparks Tribune

Cut in twain
(Myers' favorite photo)

Dennis Myers: Enroute to the universe next door
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 9-11-2019 Sparks Tribune
Obituary, 1948-2019
[En Español — La Voz Hispana En Nevada 9-18-2019]

Philippines to Burning Man to Ireland: Adios GOAT
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 9-4-2019 Sparks Tribune

Nevadian Dennis Myers: The Greatest Of All Time
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno
/ Expanded from the 8-28-2019 Sparks Tribune

Veteran Nevada reporter Myers removed from life support
Obituary:
Dennis C. Myers 1948-2019
[En Español — La Voz Hispana En Nevada 9-18-2019]

Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno
/ Special Internet Edition 8-25-2019


Reno City Council passes rent control
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 7-17-2019 Sparks Tribune

DAY OF THE DEAD
Relieve Rent & Pillage: Save SB398 & AB399

Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno
/ Special Online Legislative Edition / 4-12-2019 / Updated 4-13 and 4-14-2019 GMT
Fairness for tenants dies 4-12 unless lawmakers throw it a lifeline

Politics does not reward the shy
Rent justification and a death penalty for corporate depredation
Barbwire
by Andres Luis Barbáno
/ Expanded from the 4-10-2019 Sparks Tribune / Updated 4-11 and 4-12-2019 GMT
Fairness for tenants dies 4-12 unless lawmakers throw it a lifeline

Sore-oppressed Soul-Sister Cities: Menlo Park and Reno-Sparks-Fernley share similarly sad high-tech stretch marks.
"All humanity has left the area": paying for Tesla's Gigafactory with outrageous rents and scrambling schools
Barbano and Nevada conservatives decry corporate welfare depredations
By Rory Carroll / The Guardian 7-3-2018
Editor's Note: The Guardian publishes 180,000 newspapers daily in London and environs and generates ONE BILLION monthly web page views. (I should live so long.)
[MUCH MORE TESLACIDE]

"Facebook is taking everything": rising rents drive out Silicon Valley families
Property companies advertising their proximity to Facebook’s campus are giving low-income residents a choice: pay a huge rent increase or move out
By Sam Levin / The Guardian 6-20-2018

Rentvolution.org


We Don't Need No Education

A cuckoo coup and a president, too
Barbwire exclusive: Secret 2017 meeting set the setup in motion
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno
/ Uploaded 7-23-2019 / Expanded from the 7-24-2019 Sparks Tribune

Alfred E. Neuman for Washoe school superintendent
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 7-10-2019 Sparks Tribune

Witness at the execution
Meet the new boss, same as the old boss
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 7-3-2019 Sparks Tribune

Gang banging on 9th Street
Barbwire
by Andrew Barbáno
/ Special Barbwire Confidential Extra Edition / Monday 7-1-2019 / Updated 7-3-2019

NevadaLabor.com We Don’t Need No Education Archive

BLACK LIKE ME 2119: The problem as solution
Barbwire by Andrea Luigi Barbáno / Expanded from the 2-13-2019 Sparks Tribune / Updated 2-14 and 2-16-2019
Breaking News —> Culinary Union defeats decert at Circus Circus Reno
Dear Readers: The above column served as the conclusion of remarks I submitted before the "Tahoe Talks: Racism in America" symposium at the Incline Village, Nev., Library on February 12, 2019. So you might want to read "FADE TO BLACK" before you read "Black Like Me 2119".



$75 dead or alive: Still crazy after all these years
A mass murderer becomes famous on TV a century later

How come nobody noticed 'til now?
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno
/ Expanded from the 2-21-2018 Sparks Tribune

Triangle Shirtwaist Factory owners Max Blank and Isaac Harris. Is not Mr. Harris eerily familiar to television junkies?

From the Emmy-winning opening slate of the blockbuster "Cheers" television series. Combined with its "Frasier" spinoff, it lasted 20 years.
The "shirtwaist kings" immigrated from Russia and made a fortune manufacturing "Gibson Girl"-style blouses. (Photo, "The American Experience"/PBS)
The Emmy-winning opening slate of the "Cheers" television series before the "slate" of creators is superimposed. Looks like Mr. Harris' dead ringer (at left) is having a bloody good time.

"Who ya gonna believe, me or your own eyes?" Chico Marx disguised as Groucho Marx in "Duck Soup" (1933)
Back to the story of the 1911 Triangle Shirtwaist holocaust

Triangle tragedy recalled as requiem
"The Fire in My Mouth," a new oratorio by Pulitzer honoree Julia Wolfe, premiered with the New York Philharmonic Jan. 24

By Michael Cooper / The New York Times 1-23-2019

SITE NAVIGATION TIPS: When all else fails, read the instructions (A favorite John Hanks aphorism I've been using for decades)

NevadaLabor.com | U-News | Bulletins + Almanac
Casinos Out of Politics (COP) | Sen. Joe Neal
Guinn Watch | Deciding Factors
| BallotBoxing.US
DoctorLawyerWatch.com | Barbwire Oilogopoly Archive
Barbwire Nevada Corporate Welfare Archive
The Barbwire Molly Ivins Memorial Columniator Hall of Flames
Annual César Chávez Celebration
War Rooms:
Banks, Cabbies, Cabela's/cabellyup, Cable TV, Cancer Kids/Mining, Energy, Food, Health Care, Resurge.TV/consumers, Starbucks, Wal-Mart
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Copyright © 1982-2020 Andrew Barbano

Andrew Barbano is a 51-year Nevadan, editor of NevadaLabor.com and SenJoeNeal.org; and former chair of the City of Reno's Citizens Cable Compliance Committee. He is the executive producer of Nevada's annual César Chávez Day celebration and serves as first vice-president and political action chair of the Reno-Sparks NAACP. As always, his opinions are strictly his own. E-mail barbano@frontpage.reno.nv.us.

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

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

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