Barbwire by Barbano: 9/11 Amnesia Lane

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ANDREW BARBANO
Pirate Laureate of the High Desert Outback of the American Dream
The Barbwire Molly Ivins Memorial Columniator Hall of Flames

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Photo: Debra Reid, Sparks Tribune

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

— Leonard Cohen, 1934-2016

By Leonard Cohen (1934-2016) & Sharon Robinson
© 1988 CBS Records, Inc.

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

9/11 Amnesia Lane
Barbwire by Andrew Quarantino Barbáno / Expanded from the Sparks Tribune 9-11-2024 / Updated 9-11 & 9-12-2024 GMT / Expansions in blue /

Today brings the 23rd anniversary of Day of Infamy II, the 2001 airliners-as-cruise-missiles attack.

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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

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Last Sunday's "60 Minutes" rerun about surviving New York firefighters and their families brought me to tears.

Alas and alack, humanity in general and the USA in particular embody George Santayana's immortal admonition: “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”

The roots of 9/11 go back to at least Lawrence of Arabia. After World War One, the Brits carved up the middle east, creating imaginary "nations."

They had a helluva time trying to explain "what's a country?" to the nomadic tribes of The Levant (Arabian Peninsula).

Imaginary lines called "borders" on shifting desert sands?

The locals thought the idea just plain silly.

And thus evolved the likes of Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and other sandy banana republics.

Iran, the modern version of ancient Persia, was nonesuch. It became a democracy after WW2.

Tired of exploitation of his country's wealth, Iranian leader Mohammad Mossadegh nationalized the lucrative oil industry.

British Petroleum wanted their playground back so they sent an envoy stateside to meet with the Dulles brothers, Secretary of State John Foster and his bro, CIA Director Allen.

England and its military were too broke and broken to go to war again so soon. So they suckered us into doing their dirty work.

The dullard Dulles dastards bit.

We fell for a bright shining lie: the British possessed "intelligence" that Mossadegh was a closet commie in thrall to the Soviet Union.

Zounds!

In 1953, we overthrew Mossadegh and reinstalled the deposed Shah as our puppet dictator.

In 1979, the US embassy was invaded and the staff taken hostage after President Carter let the fleeing Shah into the US at the behest of David Rockefeller.

Ronald Reagan knocked out Carter only to become embroiled in his own illegal Iranian skulduggery.

Vietnam was a replay. Ho Chi Minh was our guy until President Truman caved to French leader Charles De Gaulle because Michelin Tire wanted their rubber plantations back.

Vietnam became America's first, but not last, military defeat.

Today, the bitter fruits of western adventurism still drip with blood in the Middle East.

When Osama bin Laden's minions were forming the 9/11 debacle, the U.S. Supreme Court had just installed an administration that ignored FBI warnings about Saudi Arab nationals taking jetliner flying lessons.

Bush the Lesser and AG John Ashcroft were too busy cutting taxes for their buds.

When all air traffic save military got grounded after the attacks, President Dubya still found time to clear a jetliner for Saudi royals to leave.

Do a websearch. You will find rewrites of history to suit the fantasies of those who glory in the inglorious past. And to chuckle at how gullible Americans can be.

Congressional Republicans recently killed long-delayed ongoing care for the Downwinders, victims of America's above-ground nuclear testing.

Actors John Wayne, Agnes Moorehead and Pedro Armendariz lie among the many dead.

WW2 left an aura of near-sanctity around the US military, an accolade richly deserved. Which didn't mean that scoundrels wouldn't betray that trust.

The Pentagon became the biggest US polluter, worse than the fossil fuel and mining industries.

We have had more than a century to learn the errors of our ways.

Collective amnesia only creates more victims and disrespects the contributions of those who gave the last full measure of devotion.

FORGETTING HISTORY, PART DEUX. Today, the Reno City Council will consider giving away Stevenson St. downtown between W. 1st and 2nd and in so doing, jeopardize a century-old icon.

The deal erodes the viability of businesses housed in the historic 20th Century Building, the brick structure with the blue awning facing the Truckee River behind St. Thomas Aquinas Cathedral.

Top Gun lawyer John White and other professional practices may find it impossible to survive in that location as developers continue to privatize formerly public parking.

Plans to make Stevenson a park evaporated several years ago, so Joni Mitchell's anthem rings true again: To pave paradise, put up a parking lot.

Call your councilcritters, (775) 393-4499.

Reno's addiction to doling out corporate welfare to the rich and powerful must stop.

Remember that the next time a pothole knocks your wheels out of alignment.

UPDATES 9-12-2024 GMT —>

LOVE'S LABOURS LOST. UNR football just completed an 0-3 hat trick against Georgia Southern after last Saturday's mayhem at Mackay Stadium.

I felt sorry for ex-Coach Ken Wilson. His predecessor, Jay Norvell, left him with a hollowed out program so Wilson's firing after just two seasons was predictable in this town which expects champagne celebrations on a beer keg budget.

Former Reno Gazette-Journal sportswriter Joe Santoro did not forget that day in 1986 when Georgia Southern first came to town and ruined UNR's undefeated season on GSU's way to the smaller school national championship.

My late wife and I were moisturized along with 13,000+ Nevada fans when hall of fame QB Tracy Ham delivered a cold shower.

I strongly recommend Santoro's retrospective in the Carson City Nevada Appeal, linked to this column at NevadaLabor,com/

FIERY BLACKOUT. I got calls this week locally and from Carson City from senior citizens who rely on over-the-air TV, as do one of every six U.S. households. KOLO-8 went dark on Friday, followed by Spectrum Cable, KRNV-4 and KTVN-2, among others.

I can understand NVEnergy cutting power to south Reno as the Davis Creek Fire rages. But local media could have done a much better job of fulfilling their obligation to inform the public.

By Sunday night, both the Reno Gazette-Journal and the Washoe Regional Emergency websites were more than 12 hours stale.

Trying to push the system late Sunday, I sent out e-mail blasts and uploaded Facebook and LinkedIn.

By dawn Monday, at least two surviving stations began running screen crawls. The emergency broadcast system was not utilized.

"This is a warning as to our vulnerabilities," I wrote, adding that "A few years back, a rural Oklahoma community was devastated because no human was working at its two radio stations when a Saturday tornado warning arrived. We've been warned."

OH, THE HUMANITY! All this is bad enough, but lack of preparedness has now gone too far.

Many fans could not watch the 49ers smoke Aaron Rodgers and the Jets on Monday Night Football.

That's just plain un-American. (2, 4 and 8 remained dark as of Tuesday and Wednesday ayem.)

Get the latest boosters, stay safe and continue to pray for Ukraine and almost 100 other currently war-torn lands.

¡Sí se puede

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

Andrew Quarantino Barbano is a 55-year Nevadan and editor of NevadaLabor.com, SenJoeNeal.org, DoctorLawyerWatch.com, BallotBoxing.US, ConsumerCoalitionv.org, ChantalCoalition.org, Rentvolution.org, MIssissippiWestNV.org and CesarChavezNevada.com among others. He is a longtime member of the Reno-Sparks NAACP and Sparks-based Communications Workers of America Local 9413/AFL-CIO. As always, his comments are entirely his own. Barbwire by Barbano has originated in the Sparks Tribune since August 12, 1988.

The Northern Nevada Central Labor Council/AFL-CIO inducted him into the César Chávez Nevada Labor Hall of Fame on April 5, 2024.

Breaking News —> Masks work!

And the plague is rampant once again. Be very afraid.

Ain't we a pair?
Dennis Myers & Andrew Barbano inducted into César Chávez Nevada Labor Hall of Fame
Barbwire by Andrew Quarantino Barbáno / Expanded from the Sparks Tribune 4-10-2024

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

Larry Barbano, Frater Mei
1947-2023

To Die For
My daughters were born 65 years ago yesterday. Alas, their youth was cut in twain.
Barbwire by Andrew Quarantino Barbáno / Expanded from the Sparks Tribune 1-17-2024

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Why the science is clear that masks work
By Zeynep Tufecki / The New York Times / 3-10-2023

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The plague is rampant once again. Be very afraid.

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$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

Wasting workers where everybody knows your name
Barbwire by Andrew Quarantino Barbáno / Expanded from the Sparks Tribune 10-18-2023

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Andrew Barbano is a 55-year Nevadan, editor of NevadaLabor.com and SenJoeNeal.org; and former chair of the City of Reno's Citizens Cable Compliance Committee. He was the longtime executive producer of Nevada's annual César Chávez Day celebration and has been a quarter-century member and 10-year officer of the Reno-Sparks NAACP. As always, his opinions are strictly his own. E-mail barbano@frontpage.reno.nv.us.

The Northern Nevada Central Labor Council/AFL-CIO inducted him into César Chávez Nevada Labor Hall of Fame on April 5, 2024.

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

Larry Barbano, Frater Mei
1947-2023

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