From the Department of Human Resources

Shutting down for a while here -- perhaps for good, perhaps not. It has less to do with there being nothing left to talk about (the opposite being closer to the truth in these news-dense days) than with there being not enough time in the day to discuss it in a manner that does the subjects justice. 

In the meantime, you can find me next door at The Barsanti Nexus, which provides linkage to my articles, reviews, and books published elsewhere by some very smart and extraordinarily generous editors.

(Update: The Department of Weekend Reading is also available at the Nexus, right-hand column, updated weekly, except when not.)
 

See you at the movies.

From the Department of Weekend Reading

Maybe every day should be Holi…

• "Fox News can’t decide, what do they love more, bombing the Middle East or bashing the president?" – Who knew Rand Paul was funny?
• Without any Western help, Outtara's rebel forces have seemingly routed their thuggish, illegitimate leader from power in the Ivory Coast. If only Libya was this easy.
• No, there's no reason to fairly tax our mega-rich plutocrat overlords – that is, unless you want a complete societal implosion.
• Florida GOP doesn't like Dems using words like, you know, on the House floor.
• Bonus GOP crazy: Texas Congressman believes that Barry committed forces to Libya as a means of creating his own super-scary totalitarian healthcare reform army! Oh, yes.
• From la-la-land to happy campers: new updates to the Oxford English Dictionary.
• It was (not so) nice while it lasted – the end of compassionate conservatism.
• Everyone's favorite atheist, Hitch, on the King James Bible.
• Here's one totally not-crazy way to get the economy started: fire all them guvmint workers!
• So that's what the ultra-secret new U.S. Army space spy plane looks like.
• The illogic of privatization: California city planning for massive layoffs (one already laid-off worker commits suicide), then hires a communication specialist for $3,000 / week.
• Now southern states are arguing over who gets to say they had the most soldiers die to defend an inhuman and feudalistic way of life.
• Ferraro and race, yes it was that ugly.
• A complete history of science-fiction, in insanely-detailed graphic form.
• The great, wild hemp fields of Brooklyn.
• X-Men, cowboys, and more Jack Sparrow: it'll be a sequel-tastic summer!
• An Easter present for the Fuhrer.
• Hard to resist: puppy vs. rottweiler.
• So many ways to die in Atari 2600 – a montage of classic video game morbidity.

From the Department of Quagmires

Could 2011 actually be the year that the allies begin their drawdown in Afghanistan? The steady increase in civilian casualties (a great majority of which still having been caused by the Taliban) has soured the population on the fighting more than ever, and just about every indicator of everyday life in the country has gotten worse, particularly with the Taliban ramping up Iraq-style terrorist attacks and assassinations.

McClatchey reported on the coming of spring and the return of the Afghan "fighting season," and the picture is bleak for the allies' International Security Assistance Force (ISAF):

Every nationwide indicator shows that security has never been so bad, including those compiled by the United Nations and the Red Cross. The Afghan government itself is among those questioning ISAF's strategy. President Hamid Karzai declared this month that international troops must "stop their operations in our land."

No matter how hard the ISAF wants to pursue their objectives in the country, with a government actively telling them to stop fighting the Taliban (this is an astonishing statement, even from somebody as mercurial and self-destructive as Karzai), how much headway can they actually make?

Add to this the gruesome reality of what is being reported about the so-called "kill team" in the 3rd Platoon, 5th Stryker Brigade -- from habitual hash smoking to purposeful killings of unarmed civilians and then gleefully photographing the results (full story at Rolling Stone here) -- and it's difficult to see how this all results in any measure of success.

Which doesn't mean that it's the right thing for the ISAF to pull out, leaving the country in the hands of Karzai's hapless and corrupt goons and the Taliban, a more toxic combination could hardly be imagined. But it does mean that the road to some version of stability for the Afghan people is getting rougher by the day.

From the Department of Evil Media

For some people, it's just never good enough. GQ editor Jim Nelson decided the other day to deliver a sarcastic little missive about the media's coverage of the ongoing Jasmine Revolution:

One day it was a normal media universe: newsreaders tossing harmless inanities at each other, cooing over video of some overgroomed terrier at the Westminster Dog Show, or warning us that residents of Wisconsin "are bracing for another winter storm." (People up north must really get tired of "bracing"—that's all they do!) And the next thing you knew, our TVs went totally Al Jazeera, with caught-off-guard networks having to report twenty-four–seven on countries most Americans couldn't point out on a map—again, much like Wisconsin.

Putting aside the tweeny-LOL-sounding "went totally Al Jazeera," there's nothing really wrong with this observation. But watch where he goes next:

It was jarring, awkward, and, I'll say it, entertaining. I love watching journalists when they start acting hugely interested in stuff they never cared about, the look of half-baked consternation they give when they have to get "up to speed" on certain subjects, such as Arabs.

So which is it, GQ? Yes, news coverage on the average day here in your United States of Manhattan is for the most part insipid and pointless drivel, agreed. But when said media finally pivots around when faced with the prospect of breaking important news, they should be, what, mocked for doing their job? Read on as Nelson goes from twittery snark to quasi-offensive and, finally, utterly pointless:

Eventually, it became fun to Know Your Middle East. On CNN, that handsome young black anchorman who looks like he would never get his hands dirty with newsprint acted completely starstruck when talking to a real-life foreign correspondent. The guy was an Aussie, as they often are, and pointed at maps with a worldliness that said "I know from Shiite!" Gosh, said the anchorman, you're a foreign correspondent. And these countries are all so different. Where of all the places, of all these countries, would you most want to...go?

As satire goes, Spy it ain't. Stick to your day-job, GQ, pondering on the importance of new developments in denim or putting together Megan Fox slideshows, and leave the media analysis -- not to mention mocking writers who actually risk their lives to report what's happening -- to people who actually watch and read the news. Howard Kurtz doesn't cover Fashion Week, and thank god for that. (Hat-tip to Mediaite for pointing out Nelson's piece originally.)

From the Department of Weekend Reading

And Libya makes three...

• A whole buncha wars, crippling deficits, and a recession that just won't go away, thank goodness Congress is considering making "In God We Trust" the national motto.
• Heritage Foundation brains discover why Detroit is shrinking -- liberals!
• Illinois man ends up on no-fly list because he emailed an imam about interfaith marriage, FBI allegedly offered to take him off it if he promised to spy for them.
• Writer claims that striving New Yorkers are so obsessed with their gadgets, they just don't care about sex anymore.
• Attack Qaddafi! No, don't! The many flips and flops of our beloved Newt.
• KV Pharmaceutical bumps up dosage cost of drug that prevents pre-term labor from $10-$20 per dose to $1,500; seems reasonable, and not at all evil.
• From Renaissance era-books to clothes to a Madonna and child statue, Anne Rice is auctioning a bunch of her stuff, and it's all on eBay.
• Keep working! The Eye of Sauron is watching.
• Remember books? The book club mailers of yesteryear.

From the Department of Labor

One hundred years ago tomorrow, a fire broke out in a Manhattan clothing factory…

• In the fire, 146 workers, mostly young immigrant women, died.
• Modern worker safety regulations were one positive outcome.
• The centennial remembrance ceremonies will begin at mid-day.
• Trailer for Marc Levin and Daphne Pinkerson's HBO documentary on the fire here.
• A century on, labor still fighting.
• Last December, 29 Bangledeshi workers, mainly making clothes for The Gap, died in tragically similar circumstances.
• Meanwhile, in Wisconsin, a judge has blocked the governor's attempt to deny unions collective bargaining rights.
• And in Michigan, some of the same folks behind Wisconsin's anti-labor assault (a murderer's row of conservative corporate villainy, from the Kochs to the Waltons and the family of Blackwater founder Erik Prince) are now going after unions there.
• Back in the home state, Wehrenberg theaters found to be flouting child labor laws.

From the Department of Wingnuttery

Today's whacked-out piece of right-wing hysteria comes courtesy of the alliteratively monikered Ron Johnson, GOP Senator from the Dairy State, who penned the following claim in yesterday's Wall Street Journal's op-ed page (which more closely resembles an unholy Tea Party / Chamber of Commerce / John Bircher coffee-klatsch with each passing day):

Today is the first anniversary of the greatest single assault on our freedom in my lifetime: the signing of ObamaCare.

According to Sen. Johnson's reasoning, the passing of health care reform not only imperils the life of his daughter, but just about every American unlucky enough to be born into such authoritarian times. 

Remember when liberals were thought of as the freaked-out whiners? Ah for the days...

From the Department of Electioneering

Finally, Lewis Black speaks the truth about what this country needs in its next president: "...a crazy third world dictator. And Donald Trump has what it takes to be that."

Video here, courtesy of TPM.

From the Department of Quagmires

A historical footnote worthy of consideration as allied planes go after Qaddafi's ground forces, now that his air-defense system has been essentially erased from the equation and questions continue to arise about where it's all going, not to mention the effectiveness and ethics of air campaigns of this sort. About a hundred years ago, the first-ever use of an airplane for military purposes took place in Libya.

On Nov. 1, 1911, Italian reconnaissance pilot Lieutenant Giulio Gavotti flew over a camp of Turkish soldiers, unpinned four grenades and dropped them, to little discernible effect. According to Gerard J. De Groot's The Bomb, "No Turks were injured in this first instance of aerial bombardment, but they were mighty angry."