Public Ed. on 'NYT' Syria Coverage

Saturday UPDATE #2 Margaret Sullivan in Sunday column reviews her first year on the job (actually quite similar to what she said in our interview several months back). One quote:
"I’m often asked what I’ve learned about The Times from this unique perch. I’ve found it to be excellent but hardly flawless, and its flaws are stubborn ones. Its resources — a top-flight newsroom of more than 1,000 people — make its journalism indispensable, but that is often accompanied by self-satisfaction. Although The Times usually corrects factual errors quickly, it is not quick to admit that matters of tone or practice could be better, or that a decision should be reconsidered; when questioned, some of its journalists shift reflexively into a defensive crouch."

Saturday UPDATE  Coincidence?  NYT finally runs prominent piece raising risks of attack on Syria (now that it's too late). 

Earlier:  Margaret Sullivan again proves her worth, raising questions (her own and from readers) about NYT's coverage of the run-up to the coming attack on Syria.  I've done this for awhile (months) on blogs and Twitter and as recently as today, noting Michael Gordon's return to the top of the home page--remember, he was Judy Miller's co-author on some of her worst Iraq pieces.  Anyway, Sullivan suggests that the paper's editorial page has been pretty cautious but its news pages too often seem to be seeing things through the eyes of the insiders and the administration. "While The Times has offered deep and rich coverage from both Washington and the Syrian region, the tone cannot be described as consistently skeptical."  (Note: My book on how the Times and others failed on Iraq, So Wrong for So Long.  My other WMD-related book: Atomic Cover-up.)

Quote of the day from the Times' number two editor, Dean Baquet, on the paper blowing Iraq WMD coverage and helping to get us into ten-year war:  "It was a long, long, time ago." Baquet, asked about advising reporters about what happened a decade ago:  “I’ve never said, ‘Let’s remember what happened with Iraq.’”

Well, his family, I can report, does serve great food at JazzFest in NOLA, from their eatery.  Trout Baquet is great.

Obama Goes to Congress on Syria

Surprise but welcome move.  Follow my Twitter feed for coverage as and after it happened.  @GregMitch  As I noted:  Hawks for attack on Syria (including those in media) acting like guy who takes viagra--and then woman postpones date. 

So maybe the belated, skeptical press reports of last two days did have an effect?  Perhaps not, and Brit Parliament vote no doubt the key.  But that did spark tougher media reports here.

Boehner says will not call House back until September 9.  Disgraceful.

Van Shows You 'The Way'

Van "The Man" Morrison turns 68 today, ironically just as the Irish, poetry lovers, and all sorts of others mourn the passing of Seamus Heaney.   One of my favorite all-time Van Morrison songs (among dozens of greats) is the uptempo "The Way Young Lovers," decidedly not the most famous cut off his legendary Astral Weeks back in 1969).  But until recently I did not know there was any kind of bootleg acoustic version.  Here it is, the the stupendous released version below (Richard Davis on standup bass, one of  the great mini-solos ever):

FBI Warns of Cyber-Attacks After Bombing of Syria

I've noted elsewhere today the NYT in its news coverage finally today (after it's too late) running some tough, and prominently featured, pieces of the risks of an air attack on Syria (the day after its public editor criticized its coverage).   A third piece today warns concerns about widespread cyber-attacks in the U.S.,  worries about actions by Syrians in the U.S., and Iran or Syria hitting Israel--among other things. 

The government has warned federal agencies and private companies that American military action in Syria could spur cyberattacks, the officials said. There were no such alerts before previous military operations, like the one against Libya in 2011.

Watching All Civilian Deaths in Syria

Human Rights Watch can hardly be accused of being soft on war crimes against civilians.  So it's significant that it's added its voice, in the form of a column by Kenneth Roth,  its executive director, to the debate over the coming attack on Syria.

Moreover, the norm against using chemical weapons is not the only international standard at stake.  There is also international law prohibiting deliberately and indiscriminately killing civilians, which the Syrian government has flouted on a much larger scale.  Against the 1,429 people whom Kerry said were killed by the chemical attack outside Damascus are the tens of thousands of civilians whom Syrian troops and militia have killed in two-and-a-half years of war.  Armed opposition groups have also committed their share of indiscriminate shelling and serious abuses against suspected government supporters.

Upholding the norm that civilians should never be gassed is important.  So is upholding the law against this broader killing of civilians—which Obama previously described as “a core national security interest.”  As the United States prepares to lead a military attack in Syria, the campaign will be measured by its consequences.  Will it enhance protection for all Syrian civilians, regardless of how they are attacked?  Or does the United States have other plans for doing that?  Neither Obama nor Kerry has said. 

'NYT' Finally With Key Piece Warning of Syria Attack

Yesterday I covered NYT public editor Margaret Sullivan asserting that the paper had covered the run-up to the attack on Syria without enough skepticism and from too much of an administration view.  In what we'll assume is merely coincidence (?), the Times--later than most other top outlets--today finally not only published a piece  on experts warning about risks of attack, but placed it at the top of its Web site.  Of course, it's now too late to do much good, with Kerry and Obama announcing yesterday that there was no turning back.  One might imagine that while today's piece was surely in the works before yesterday, the decision to put it at the top of the home page might have been sparked by the public editor's critique.  But anyway:

Supporters of the president’s proposal contend that a limited punitive strike can be carried out without inflaming an already volatile situation. But a number of diplomats and other experts say it fails to adequately plan for a range of unintended consequences, from a surge in anti-Americanism that could bolster Syria’s president, Bashar al-Assad, to a wider regional conflict that could drag in other countries, including Israel and Turkey.

And the second story at the top of the home page right now?  Amid Skepticism, White House Tries to Shore Up Support.


Sullivan yesterday quoted #2 editor Dean Baquet admitting he never reminded editors or writers about the paper's monumental failures on Iraq WMD, and said of that fiasco that it was "a long, long, time ago." 

Did We Know About Chem Attack in Advance?

Whoops.  U.S. claiming it knew of preparations for chem attack in Syria three days before it happened.  Of course, could be blowing smoke, so to speak, but raises question:  Why didn't we notify Syria's rebels.  They get it, apparently, as this makes clear, from Foreign Policy.

Saturday update:    After criticism from its public editor, NYT finally with a couple tough pieces on risks of attacking Syria now. 

Kerry on Syria

My report on his address just now, as it happened, starting at 12:59.  Full document from White House now out.

--Releasing unclassified findings.  "As clear as they are compelling...I'm not asking you to take my word for it.  Read for yourself" from "thousands of sources." Assad regime inflicted it.  "Our intelligence community" probed and "it has done so more than mindful of the Iraq experience.  We will not repeat that moment." So releasing lot for you to judge.  But some only to be released to Congress.  "So some things we know we cannot talk about publicly."

--So what do we know?  Assad has largest store of chem weapons and has "used them multiple times this year," though on lower scale.   And we know they wanted to rid suburbs of rebels.  And know they had people "on ground preparing for this" three days before.  And "we know" where rockets launched and when and where they landed.  And "we know" as does the world that "all hell broke loose in the social media."   Thousands of reports from 11 sites. And reports from doctors.

--At least more than 1400 killed including 426 children.   "This is the indiscriminate horror of chemical weapons...this is what Assad did to his own people."   And we confirmed a "senior official" knew this.  Kerry personally asked them to let UN in but they bombed area instead for four days.   When UN inspectors finally gained access it was "restricted and controlled" [he does not mention that it was partly or largely by the rebels].

--Repeatedly says "we know" and "these are the facts."  So only question is "what to do." Refers to "consequences" and "red line" and treaties.  "It matters to OUR security" and Israel and other friends who "live just a stiff breeze from Damascus."  They need to know where chem weapons are.

--Matters to our security to do something because everyone "watching" if our word means anything and if Syria "can get away with it"--and so maybe they too can get away with bad stuff.  "What is the risk of doing nothing?"   Live in world where "thug" like Assad gasses own people and we do nothing?  So risk from others then.  Mentions Iran getting nukes, Hezbollah, North Korea. Keep mentions "stopping" Assad from future use [is this possible? no].

--Answers question of "who we are.  We are the United States of America."   This "crime against conscience, against humanity...this matters to us.  Matters to who we are, and to leadership, and our credibility in the world.  It matters if nothing is done.  It matters if world speaks out in condemnation and nothing done."  Cites others speaking out (but none of them taking action, BTW).  Mentions our "oldest ally, the French"--what a switch.

--"What will we do?  President Obama believes in the United Nations."  And great respect for the inspectors.  But UN will not affirm who used the weapons. "The UN can't tell you anything we haven't already shared with you and that we already know."  But we'll keep talking to Congress, our allies and public.  But Obama "will make decision based on our OWN interests."   We are all tired of war but 'fatigue" does not absolve us.

--No "boots on the ground," limited and tailored "to insure that a despot's use of chemical weapons is held responsible."  But also committed to "diplomacy" and "political" and "deeply committed to getting there."   No regime change. Ends, 17 minutes long.

Wolf Blitzer: No doubt know we will launch, but when?  "Fairly soon" all agree.  And CNN switches to amped-up war coverage with generals and experts on board talking about targets, number of missiles, etc.

Bombing Chem Sites: More Harm Than Good?

The Associated Press, not always exactly bold, has had a few tough-minded piece on the Syria crisis this week, capped today by this one, which they have headlined at their own site:  "Experts:  Don't Bomb Chemical Weapons Sites in Syria."  A welcome shift from the usual he said/she said.  Mike Calderone at Huff Post with eye-opener on possibly why AP has been tough:  reporters were reminded of Iraq WMD failures.  Latest from AP opens:

You simply can't safely bomb a chemical weapon storehouse into oblivion, experts say. That's why they say the United States is probably targeting something other than Syria's nerve agents.  But now there is concern that bombing other sites could accidentally release dangerous chemical weapons that the U.S. military didn't know were there because they've lost track of some of the suspected nerve agents.

Bombing stockpiles of chemical weapons — purposely or accidentally — would likely kill nearby civilians in an accidental nerve agent release, create a long-lasting environmental catastrophe or both, five experts told The Associated Press. That's because under ideal conditions — and conditions wouldn't be ideal in Syria — explosives would leave at least 20 to 30 percent of the poison in lethal form.

UK Says No to Obama

After wonderful long debate--which we'll never see in our Congress, to our shame--the British Parliament just voted down okay to hit Syria, 285-272 (and the debate didn't seem that close).  Just as important, Cameron said he would abide by it.  One member shouts, "Resign!"  Setback for Tories. The Guardian blog:

Ed Milband stands up on a point of order.

He asks for an assurance that the govenrment will not use the royal perogative to start military intervention.

Cameron says he believes in respecting the will of the House.

He says he "gets" the message.

When Parody Meets Reality

Andy Borowitz at The New Yorker:

Attempting to quell criticism of his proposal for a limited military mission in Syria, President Obama floated a more modest strategy today, saying that any U.S. action in Syria would have “no objective whatsoever.”

“Let me be clear,” he said in an interview on CNN. “Our goal will not be to effect régime change, or alter the balance of power in Syria, or bring the civil war there to an end. We will simply do something random there for one or two days and then leave.”

“I want to reassure our allies and the people of Syria that what we are about to undertake, if we undertake it at all, will have no purpose or goal,” he said. “This is consistent with U.S. foreign policy of the past.”

Booing Bob Revisited

Just came across this free online recording of one of the most infamous Dylan concerts ever.  The world well remember the controversy when he "went electric" at Newport in the summer of 1965 but how many know that his very next concert, when he really unveiled his rock persona (in second half of concert), took place on August 28 in Forest Hills and that the crowd would be the most critical and dangerous ever, as Al Kooper and Greil Marcus have testified. 

No video of this ever but now here's a crappy but listenable sound recording.  For a flavor of the angry responses to electric Dylan from a large part of the crowd check out the Intro and the Intermission comments (with Murray the K), and then at end of songs in second half when there's a lot of booing and so forth.  The band includes Robbie Robertson on guitar and Levon Helm on drums.  (Note: I see Dylan live in Buffalo a few months later and protestors brought cowbells.)  Watch Harvey Brooks, the bass player, talk about it here.  Here's a Wikipedia account:

Photographer Daniel Kramer, who accompanied Dylan to the Forest Hills concert, wrote: "Dylan held a conference with the musicians who were going to accompany him in the second half of the concert. He told them that they should expect anything to happen—he probably was remembering what occurred at Newport. He told them that the audience might yell and boo, and that they should not be bothered by it. Their job was to make the best music they were capable of, and let whatever happened happen."

Musician Tony Glover, in his liner notes for the Bob Dylan Live 1966 album, quotes a contemporary account of the concert from Variety: "Bob Dylan split 15,000 of his fans down the middle at Forest hills Tennis Stadium Sunday night... The most influential writer-performer on the pop music scene during the past decade, Dylan has apparently evolved too fast for some of his young followers, who are ready for radical changes in practically everything else... repeating the same scene that occurred during his performance at the Newport Folk Festival, Dylan delivered a round of folk-rock songs but had to pound his material against a hostile wall of anti-claquers, some of whom berated him for betraying the cause of folk music."

Shooting the Teacher

From longtime ace blogger Digby, worth quoting in its entirety, see original here.
***

You cannot make this stuff up:

Arkansas state Sen. Jeremy Hutchinson (R), who is leading an effort to give guns to school personnel, accidentally shot a teacher during an "active shooter" drill earlier this year, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reports.

"The experience gave Hutchinson some pause, but he still supports giving schools the authority to decide how best to secure their campuses."

Luckily the gun that shot the teacher was only loaded with rubber bullets so no harm no foul. (If we can only get all the armed lunatics to use them too we can arm everybody and have shoot-out all day long with no consequences!) Just because you've proved in living color that flying bullets from the "good guys" can harm innocent people exactly as flying bullets from the "bad guys" do, doesn't mean that you should change your opinion about everybody and their grandmother packing heat at all times. Just take a pause, stick your fingers in your ears and sing lalalalalala!

Update:  Oh dear God.  I've just been informed that Jeremy Hutchinson is the nephew of Asa Hutchinson, the former Impeachment manager, DEA chief, Head of Birder enforcement and ... current leader of the NRA's "arm the teachers" task force.

Norman Rush Returns

NYT Magazine with major feature this Sunday, posted today, on Norman Rush, author of one of my favorite novels, Mating, and also a semi-neighbor (he lives up the road a piece here in my county near the animal shelter where we got our beloved cat).   We have a bit of correspondence years ago.   He only writes a book every ten years or so, and happily a new one is about to come out.   Like me he often refers to "my beautiful wife."

Updates: Evidence on Syria Far From 'Slam Dunk'

Thursday Updates:   Surprisingly tough AP report today, based on intel sources, that evidence re: chem attack far from a "slam dunk," huge gaps in evidence and even:  "The complicated intelligence picture raises questions about the White House's full-steam-ahead approach to the Aug. 21 attack on a rebel-held Damascus suburb, with worries that the attack could be tied to al-Qaida-backed rebels later."  And: "The uncertainty calls into question the statements by Kerry and Vice President Joe Biden."

UN finishing probe in Syria and, surprise (to some), promises some sort of report Saturday.  Turns out, as we warned, the pundits and official and unofficial U.S. sources were wrong (and probably knew it) this week--evidence of attack was NOT that degraded and it is NOT taking weeks for some kind of testing and assessment. 

UPDATE  NYT tonight with a kind of shocker--after much fulminating and bloviating, it now appears the big White House intel report slamming Assad tomorrow may be very limited, and suddenly they are trying to lower expectations.   Paper notes Colin Powell's UN presentation on Iraq as bad role model.

Earlier: As usual, the great Amy Davidson at The New Yorker nails it.   UPDATE  John Cassidy, another New Yorker "old reliable," adds his warnings there.  James Fallows joins in here.

As of Wednesday afternoon, eighty-eight members of Congress had signed a letter put together by Scott Rigell, a Virginia Republican with a lot of service members in his district, asking Obama to reconvene them and get authorization for any attack. Most of those who signed on were Republicans, but not all of them. Obama could do so if he wanted to. John Boehner could also bring back the House, and Harry Reid the Senate; it would be a mistake not to.

What is the disadvantage of going to Congress? That they are loud and annoying and someone will try to introduce a resolution tying action in Syria to Obamacare? If the Administration can’t stand up to Ted Cruz, it can hardly hope to frighten Bashar al-Assad. And if going to Congress now feels time-consuming, how does it compare to the hours, days, weeks, and sanity expended on the Benghazi hearings?

Brit Debate Causes Delay in Attack on Syria?

The Guardian with, perhaps, some welcome news, as they report that MP protests in London have yet to be quelled and likely (they say) put off any U.S. assault on Syria until about Tuesday.   Of course, who cares about U.S. Congress.

British prime minister David Cameron conceded that MPs would be given a second vote to approve military action to defuse a parliamentary revolt, ahead of a Commons debate on Syria on Thursday. UK sources insisted that the US, which had planned to launch the strikes by the weekend, had delayed, handing Cameron a lifeline, and revived a back-up plan to delay the strikes until Tuesday when Barack Obama is due to set out for the G20 summit in Russia.

In an effort to build support for punitive strikes, the US and UK will on Thursday publish a joint summary of the intelligence which they say points towards the Assad regime's responsibility for the poison gas attack of 21 August in Ghouta, eastern Damascus, that killed over 1,000 people.

In a reflection of the different political pressures pulling the transatlantic allies in different directions, Downing Street undertook to return to the security council in a renewed effort to secure a UN mandate for military action after Russia blocked a British resolution at an informal meeting in New York. But the US state department meanwhile insisted it saw "no avenue forward" at the UN for finding an international consensus for armed action, because of Russian support for Bashar al-Assad's regime.

U.S.: "We Don't Need No Stinkin' Inspections"

Video of four UN vehicles arriving today in Damascus suburb to further probe chemical attack evidence--a probe which U.S. says is needless and should end now.

He Meant, 'Shoot, What a Great Black Man'

A town official in Maine, and candidate for another office, posted on his Facebook page endorsing move to impeach the president, adding a photo and, apparently, the heading, "Shoot the N-word."  Now been visited by the Secret Service.  Love his defense:

"I think it's a lot of hogwash," he said. "I did not threaten the president. ... I might have used the wrong words. ... I didn't say I was going to do it."

"What I really meant to say is, 'When are we going to get rid of this (expletive),'" Marsters added. "I should have said, 'I hope the bastard dies.'"

Career Killer

No, we're not talking Miley here, but the only music video that is said to have killed a career instantly.  Yes, it's this "classic" from Billy Squier, who sucked anyway, story all about it here.

Reich Makes Right

Facebook post by Robert Reich raising alarm--or at least asking for debate--on Syria, and domestic fallout.

We're about to go into Syria. I can't tell you at this point how, but the U.S. is readying an offensive. We're rounding up allies, as we did before we went into Iraq. The White House is preparing the American people, as another White House did before Iraq. But doesn't this at least deserve a real debate? The silence in America is deafening. Didn't we learn anything from Iraq? Or, for that matter, from Vietnam?

I'm as appalled as anyone by the Syrian regime and its use of chemical weapons on its own people. But what exactly do we expect to achieve by entering this fray? And at what cost -- to us, to the Syrian people, to the tinderbox of the Middle East?

Normally I don't venture into foreign policy, but foreign and domestic policy aren't easily separated. At a time when almost one in four American children is in poverty, when the middle class is struggling to make ends meet, when inequality is widening, and we're dis-investing in infrastructure and education, can we really afford what this initiative could easily mushroom into? We have seen the power of the military-industrial-congressional complex to get its way, to get the dollars it wants, and to sway public opinion in the direction that will be most profitable to it. At the very least, we deserve a full and frank discussion of what the Obama Administration is about to get us into.

Another Famous Day in August 28 History: The Chicago 'Police Riot'

Fifty years ago today,  Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his famous "I Have a Dream" speech at the turning point March on Washington.  But, in my life, today also marks another important and influential day:  45 years ago tonight the infamous "police riot" near the Democratic Convention in Chicago took place.  I was too young for the King march--but old enough to journey to Chicago for that brutal week in 1968.  Here's a piece I wrote not long along ago about how I witnessed that at close hand.
 ***
Forty-five years ago my trip to Chicago for the Democratic National Convention would culminate in the crushing of Sen. Eugene McCarthy's anti-Vietnam crusade inside the convention hall and the cracking of peacenik skulls by Mayor Richard Daley's police in the streets. Together, this doomed Hubert Humphrey to defeat in November at the hands of Richard Nixon.

I'd been a political-campaign junkie all my life. At the age of 8, I paraded in front of my boyhood home in Niagara Falls, N.Y., waving an "I Like Ike" sign. In 1968 I got to cover my first presidential campaign when one of Sen. McCarthy's nephews came to town, before the state primary, and I interviewed him for the Niagara Falls Gazette, where I worked as a summer reporter during college. I had been chair of the McCarthy campaign at my college. So much for non-biased reporting!

My mentor at the Gazette was a young, irreverent City Hall reporter named John Hanchette. He went on to an illustrious career at other papers, and as a Pulitzer Prize-winning national correspondent for Gannett News Service. Hanchette was in Chicago that week to cover party politics as a Gazette reporter and contributor to the Gannett News Service (GNS). I was to hang out with the young McCarthyites and the anti-war protesters. To get to Chicago I took my first ride on a jetliner.

To make a long story short: On the climactic night of Aug. 28, 1968, Hanchette and I ended up just floors apart in the same building: the Conrad Hilton Hotel in downtown Chicago. I was in McCarthy headquarters and Hanchette was in one of Gannett's makeshift newsrooms.  Just after the peace plank to the DNC platform was defeated,  TV coverage switched to shocking scenes of young folks getting beaten with nightsticks on the streets of Chicago, but we didn't know where.  Then we smelled tear gas and someone  the curtains along a wall of windows and we looked out  to see police savagely attacking protesters with nightsticks at the intersection directly below.

Soon I headed for the streets. By that time, the peak violence had passed, but cops were still pushing reporters and other innocent bystanders through plate glass windows at the front of the hotel. I held back in the lobby, where someone had set off a stink bomb. Some Democrats started returning from the convention hall -- after giving Humphrey the nomination even though McCarthy and Bobby Kennedy won most of the primaries -- as protesters inside the Hilton chanted, "You killed the party! You killed the party!"  And: "You killed the country." And, of course, "Dump the Hump!"

Finally, I screwed up my courage and crossed to Grant Park where the angry protest crowd gathered. And there I stayed all night, as the crowd and chants of "pig" directed at the cops increased. Many in the crowd wore bandages of had fresh blood on their faces. Phil Ochs (later a friend)  arrived and sang, along with other notables, including some of the peacenik delegates. Cops lined the park -- backed up by jeeps with machines guns pointed at us.  Yes, that happened.

When I returned to Niagara Falls that Friday, I wrote a column for that Sunday's paper. I described the eerie feeling of sitting in Grant Park, and thousands around me yelling at the soldiers and the media, "The whole world is watching!" -- and knowing that, for once, it was true.

More than 35 years later, after I had written two books on other infamous political campaigns, I returned to Chicago for a staged performance of a musical based on one of them. As I got out of a cab to make my way to the theater, I had an eerie feeling and, sure enough, looking up the street I noticed Grant Park a block away -- and the very intersection in front of the Hilton where skulls were cracked that night in 1968.

P.S. Norman Mailer's terrific book, Miami and the Siege of Chicago, is still in print.

All He Had to Do Was 'Dream'

Op-ed at NYT by author of book on MLK's "I Have a Dream" speech 50 years ago--explaining how the "dream" thing was "improvised," with a little help from....Mahalia Jackson.   He had only five minutes for the speech and decided to cut a few things at the end and add that little thing.  As we know, the Wash Post didn't even mention it.

'So Wrong' Again?

New relevance, perhaps, for my book on how Bush--and the media--got us into Iraq (for years), "So Wrong for So Long."

Assad Day Indeed

 Late Tuesday:  Classic NYT op-ed posted tonight, with this headline:  Bomb Syria, Even It It Is Illegal.

 "As a legal matter, the Syrian government’s use of chemical weapons does not automatically justify armed intervention by the United States. Bomb Syria, Even If It's Illegal."  There are moral reasons for disregarding the law, and I believe the Obama administration should intervene in Syria. But it should not pretend that there is a legal justification in existing law. Secretary of State John Kerry seemed to do just that on Monday, when he said of the use of chemical weapons, “This international norm cannot be violated without consequences.” His use of the word “norm,” instead of “law,” is telling.

A different view from James Fallows.

New relevance, perhaps, for my book on how Bush--and the media--got us into Iraq (for years), "So Wrong for So Long." 

 Earlier: My piece at The Nation collects media views on Syria, including those of "liberal hawks."

Dubya: From Lyin' to Feline

Gawker with hysterical review of newly emerged latest from the brush of Bush--new paintings from the former president and our new Van Ga.   He's now left his "immature" dog period andentered his "cat period" and has already come up with a "masterpiece" (left). 

Finally, Something Wise on Going Gaga Over Miley

Special thanks to Sadhbh Walshe for this.  A sad, thirty-year history.  Though she still does seem to come down on the tired old "if-a-woman-is-really-in-charge-of-her-brand-it's-okay." A couple  excerpts:

Unwittingly, however, Cyrus may have done us all a service by illustrating in a painfully embarrassing way how casually the music industry exploits women and how casually women in the music industry allow themselves to be exploited.

You can see why a 20-year-old up and coming pop star might be confused about whatʼs acceptable and what isnʼt when it comes to baring it all, or at least most of it, during a live performance. Apparently, itʼs okay to gyrate on stage in a bikini so long as you can sell it as art form or as an act of female self empowerment, even if itʼs anything but. Back in the early 1990s when Queen of Pop, Madonna, was pioneering the art of simulated masturbation on stage, she managed to pass it off as a grand gesture of female self determination. Itʼs quite a feat when you think about it, to cast oneself as a great feminist crusader while you perfect the art of self objectification and then go on to spend your entire career pandering to the male gaze. To Madonnaʼs credit, however, she did push the boundaries of female sexuality along the way and at least did so in a way that has been interesting to watch.

Re-Play of 2003?

As I have noted previously, one can't take the comparisons to our invasion of Iraq precisely.   The current crisis in Syria is certainly different--there may have been a real chemical attack vs. the absence of WMD in 2003--but the drumbeats for war feel familiar.  I warned yesterday that the U.S. was now repeating one move in 2003--questioning value of UN inspections, claiming they come too late, and then asking the inspectors to leave for their own safety since we might start bombing at any time.  This basically worked then, if you want to look at it that way.

Now today comes word that the second day of UN inspections were called off after inspectors said their safety was threatened there.  And the culprits?  The UN confirms it was the rebels.  Who for some reason don't want the inspections now?  And are just buying time until a U.S. missile strike on, say, Thursday?  Yesterday Sec of State Kerry suggested that the sniper fire that hindered the inspectors came from the Assad side--which he probably knew was false or unproven but made the charge anyway. 

Portrait of Dylan

UPDATE:  CD released today.  Seems like half of cuts might be very good, better versions than what released.

Earlier:  I've posted here previously about Bob's upcoming massive release of outtakes from his oft-mocked Self-Portrait/New Morning period (although the latter album was pretty good).   Now they're letting you livestream a bunch of cuts.  The "Highway 61" with The Band is pretty damn good, and also reveals that Dylan's "Nashville" croon voice (from the same period) was a kind of joke--or should have been.

Greatest Song Came Out of March on Washington--and Dylan

As I've posted and tweeted before, I consider Sam Cooke's "Change Is Gonna Come" the greatest song of our era.  Rolling Stone calls "Like a Rolling Stone" the greatest single and I list Dylan's Highway 61 as the greatest album.  Now how does this sort of fit together? It's still little known that Sam Cooke's response to Bob's "Blowin' in the Wind" becoming the new anthem of the civil rights movement--as it was enshrined at the March on Washington fifty years ago, via Peter, Paul and Mary--was to 1) record it himself  2) determine that a black writer should pen such an anthem himself or herself.  So he wrote "Change Is Gonna Come," inspired you might say by Dylan.   Here's Sam and below that the Peter, Paul and Mary performance at the march.

Blast from the Pre-Butt Crack Past

Have to laugh at all those claiming Miley "crossed the line" at VMAs when lines were crossed long ago and few complained, ever celebrated it.  Also, some prominent TV liberals now mocking pundits who critique the seemingly mandatory, highly-sexualized, always suggestive, performances by most of the top female singers--from Grammys to Super Bowls--rather than hitting the long-running but now escalating trend in that direction.  As the risk of being accused of telling kids to get off my lawn, I will say that some of  us Boomers recall the 1970s, in the afterglow of the rise of feminism, when the top singers did not have to show cleavage, or thighs up to their waists, let alone butts or even butt cracks, did not grab their crotch or their partner's crotch.   Carole King.  Joni Mitchell.  Linda Ronstadt.  Stevie Nicks.  Patti LaBelle.  Aretha.   In that group, Debbie Harry was most "suggestive," but now seems quaint.   Then along came MTV and the rest is history.  And here's Patti Smith from 1976:

When Billy Graham Called for 'Throat Slashing'

I'm a day or two behind this, even though I have covered other low-lights from the last batch of Nixon tapes just released.  This one finds Nixon, after his first big Watergate speech, asking the Rev. Billy Graham how he thought coverage on CBS went.   Billy replies, "I felt like slashing their throats." His people claim he was merely speaking in a "euphemism."

A response:  "Even Nixon, who was stone cold silent in response, seemed astounded. When you can freak out the notoriously profane Richard Nixon, that speaks volumes."

But U.S. Doesn't Want to See Evidence

Video of UN inspector studying alleged chemical weapon shell today.

Killer Cats

Very funny accounting of the secret lives of your cuddly little house cat, when they go outside.  "Dogs are a man's best friend.  Cats are a man's serial killers."

'New Yorker' Goes Inside MSNBC

Piece in this week's issue, available in full or in part (for non-payers) here.   Opens with look at QB Maddow and post-Keith wonk emphasis, then into problems.  Comes as same day Chris Hayes admits to Mike Calderone at Huff Post that his ratings are in the crapper.

Party Like It's 2003

Monday Updates:    NYT with lengthy and chilling re-creation of the alleged chemical attack just posted tonight.

Eugene Robinson joins liberal hawks tonight in calling for strike on Assad at Wash Post. Admits history against it but gotta do it.  "Must be punished."

U.S. trying same trick as it successfully did in Iraq--telling UN to pull inspectors out because we may start bombing at any moment.  This ended inspections--which were finding no WMD--in Iraq, but so far UN holding firm.  But no specific U.S. warning of pending attack but could come any minute.

Kerry gives bellicose speech.  UN inspectors disagree that no good evidence left--they say they collected plenty today.  But administration view: "We don't need no stinkin' UN evidence."

Dexter Filkins joins liberal hawks in calling for attack in new piece at the New Yorker.  After recounting moving talk with journalist/witness to last week's bombing, he admits our attack now could make things worse (and no rebel leader to trust)--but have got to try.  David Frum at Twitter just outlined several good reasons to resist this impulse.  

My former congressman Eliot Engel begs Obama to bomb Syria--and says he does not even need to consult Congress, just do it.

NYT in lead story promotes attack by citing anonymous White House official and rebels both saying UN inspection worthless because evidence of chemical degraded by now--without going to any experts to judge if this is actually true.  The truth is that, yes, by some degrading--but far from too late.  Even McClatchy just gets quote from an expert on how long inspecting must take, not on the degrading aspect.


Good round-up of newspaper editorial pages calling for a strike on Syria from co-author of my U.S. vs. Private Manning book.


UPDATE:  Gotta love McClatchy, which like other news outlets today cites in opening graf of story that Obama now deeply considering strikes on Syria, but unlike others, adds in 2nd graf:  "But any strike against Syrian President Bashar Assad’s regime would occur over the misgivings of a majority of Americans, according to a new poll, and with only limited support from Congress. The fallout from such action includes likely retaliation from Iran, Russia and the Lebanese militant group, Hezbollah – Assad’s three chief foreign patrons – and could draw the United States deeply into a new Middle East conflict after years of entanglement in Iraq and Afghanistan."

Read more here: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2013/08/25/200333/us-appears-to-weigh-military-response.html?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter&utm_term=news#storylink=cpy

Earlier: Repeat of Iraq 2003?  Syria today okays inspection of site of alleged chem attack by UN but U.S. racing to launch attack before inspectors can report?  Already were reports today from White House or military sources saying "too late."  And complaint that no firm date given.  Now (according to Richard Engel in a tweet) Syria says:  tomorrow.   So rockets may fly tonight.

Even some good people often critical of hasty moves have fallen into line on this--you know who you are.   We recall the self-proclaimed "liberal hawks" and (in Bill Keller's immortal phrase) "reluctant hawks" who backed Iraq invasion, to their and our shame.  You'll ID them now by their full cynicism about worth of UN inspections, "came to late," "won't have full access" etc.  Also references to Kosovo.  Maybe we'll attack before McClatchy has a chance for a few full reports.  Recall that UN inspectors were on ground in Iraq in 2003 and finding nothing (accurately) and we didn't care.

In the case of Syria, there is actually more seeming evidence, if no proof, simply because a top aid group said yesterday they'd treated 3000 with some sort of toxic symptoms, though from unknown cause and perps. But hey, let's rush to attack--after sitting by for months--without on-the-ground proof.  

NFL: Heading for Trouble

Here's the trailer for the upcoming PBS Frontline probe on concussions in the NFL--viewing this reportedly caused ESPN to pull out of their partnership on the doc, afraid to anger NFL.

Bad Timing? Files Show U.S. Helped Saddam As He Used Chem Weapons

Not exactly the best news for the White House as it ramps up for attack on Syria.  The reputable Foreign Policy magazine reports this and charges U.S. with "complicity":

The U.S. government may be considering military action in response to chemical strikes near Damascus. But a generation ago, America's military and intelligence communities knew about and did nothing to stop a series of nerve gas attacks far more devastating than anything Syria has seen, Foreign Policy has learned.

In 1988, during the waning days of Iraq's war with Iran, the United States learned through satellite imagery that Iran was about to gain a major strategic advantage by exploiting a hole in Iraqi defenses. U.S. intelligence officials conveyed the location of the Iranian troops to Iraq, fully aware that Hussein's military would attack with chemical weapons, including sarin, a lethal nerve agent....

In contrast to today's wrenching debate over whether the United States should intervene to stop alleged chemical weapons attacks by the Syrian government, the United States applied a cold calculus three decades ago to Hussein's widespread use of chemical weapons against his enemies and his own people. The Reagan administration decided that it was better to let the attacks continue if they might turn the tide of the war. And even if they were discovered, the CIA wagered that international outrage and condemnation would be muted. 

It has been previously reported that the United States provided tactical intelligence to Iraq at the same time that officials suspected Hussein would use chemical weapons. But the CIA documents, which sat almost entirely unnoticed in a trove of declassified material at the National Archives in College Park, Md., combined with exclusive interviews with former intelligence officials, reveal new details about the depth of the United States' knowledge of how and when Iraq employed the deadly agents. They show that senior U.S. officials were being regularly informed about the scale of the nerve gas attacks. They are tantamount to an official American admission of complicity in some of the most gruesome chemical weapons attacks ever launched.

MLK on 'MTP'

You've probably heard about this but if you haven't seen you really must watch  Meet the Press re-broadcast of its interviews with Dr. King and Roy Wilkins 50 years ago.  Note that David Gregory in intro failing to mention pathetic, obnoxious, questions throughout.  But then would Gregory even recognize?

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

When 'Born to Run' Was Born

The iconic breakthrough Springsteen album released on this day in 1975.  We had just given our friend his first magazine cover at  Crawdaddy--more than two-and-a-half years after publishing first magazine feature (fun video here).  Here's collection of nine outtakes or rough versions from the album, including quite different  "Thunder Road."  By the way, I will always believe I inspired the famous Roy Orbison line (see upcoming memoir).

68 Years Ago: Time to 'Get the Anti-Propagandists Out

As I've noted in many previous posts--and in my book Atomic Cover-up--the U.S. after dropping the bombs over Hiroshima and Nagasaki was confronted with a worldwide publicity (not to mention,  moral) problem:  reports from Japan of a mysterious new disease afflicting survivors of the twin blasts.  Some there were already dubbing it "radiation disease," which was what our bomb-makers and policy-makers expected--but still, officials and most in media in U.S. mocked the idea.  No one from the West had yet reached either city.

Sixty-eight years ago today one of the most remarkable conversations of the nuclear took place. 

Gen. Leslie Groves, head of the Manhattan Project (with J. Robert Oppenheimer, left), had received a telex the day before from Los Alamos, as scientists asked for information on those reports from Japan. Groves responded that they were nothing but "a hoax" or "propaganda."  The top radiation expert at Los Alamos also used the word "hoax."  Knowing that the press would be seeking his official response, Groves called Lt. Col. Charles Rea, a doctor at Oak Ridge hospital (part of the bomb project).  According to the official transcript, Rea called the reports of death-by-radiation "kind of crazy" and Groves joked, "Of course, it's crazy--a doctor like me can tell that."

But Groves knew it wasn't crazy and he grew agitated as he read passages from the Japanese reports.  He even asked if there was "any difference between Japanese blood and others."  Both men ultimately seized on the idea that everything was attributable to burns--or "good thermal burns," as Rea put it.  Groves replied, "Of course we are getting a good dose of propaganda"--and blamed some of our scientists and our media for some of that.  Groves revealed, "We are not bothered a bit, excepting for --what they are trying to do is create sympathy."

But Rea surely knew they were merely denying reality, admitting finally, "Of course, those Jap scientists over there aren't so dumb either."  Still, in a second conversation that day with Groves, Rea advised: "I think you had better get the anti-propagandists out."  One of the great quotes of our time. 

Five days later, on a visit to Oak Ridge, Groves labelled the reports from Japan propaganda and added, "The atomic bomb is not an inhuman weapon."

Groves' top aide, Kenneth D. Nichols, would admit in his 1987 memoirs that "we knew that there would be many deaths and injuries caused by the radiation..."  Much more on the decades-long cover-up, including film footage, in my book (and see below).

New Film and Book Reveal Salinger Secrets, They Say

Sunday Update #2  NYT has obtained a copy of the Salinger book and just reviewed by Kakutani.  She calls it a bit slapdash, confirm earlier reports on the plans to publish new books by him (see below) and adds:  'The sharp-edged portrait of Salinger that Mr. Shields and Mr. Salerno draw in this book is that of a writer whose 'life was a slow-motion suicide mission' — a man who never recovered from the horrors of wartime combat and the soul-shaking sight of a Nazi death camp filled with burned and smoldering corpses."

Thanks partly to religion the authors says he ended up as a "blinkered and condescending curmudgeon who is frequently guilty of the same sort of phoniness or hypocrisy his characters so deplored."  You have to wonder about their claim that he stayed out of the media glare because he was allegedly born with one testicle....Shields is author of recent Kurt Vonnegut bio.  My new Vonnegut ebook here.

Sunday:  NYT just up with story revealing secrets from the film and book (co-authored by David Shields.  There are new Salinger books coming, as instructed, starting in 2015, they claim.  They also reveal, among other things, details about his first wife (German woman he sent back home after learning she may have helped Gestapo) and affair with teen (dumped her after sleeping with her once, allegedly).  And more.

Earlier: Great mysteries surrounded J.D. Salinger after he semi-disappeared, back in the mid-1960s, and then in the past year, re: an upcoming documentary about him, the first of its kind.   What exactly did the film-makers discover?  Secrecy has been the key.  I know this terrain well, as a Salinger reader back in the '60s, then as an editor at Crawdaddy in the '70s when we assigned the ritual "find Salinger" cover story (more about that in my upcoming memoir).  Anyway: I happened to see the trailer for the film last night and here it is.   Also: Speaking of novelists popular with young people, my new ebook on Kurt Vonnegut.

Cohen Does Simon

Just came across this, Leonard Cohen, our greatest living poet, reciting Paul Simon's "Sounds of Silence," with a few twists.  And then, below that, he recites part of his "Alexandra Leaving." Sharon Robinson, who wrote the music, then sings it. One of the greatest songs of our time.

Dylan at the March on Washington

Fifty years ago, joined by Joan Baez.

68 Years Ago: Many A-Bomb Survivors Afflicted With Mysterious Disease

This is an original United Press dispatch from 1945 below.    Of course the strange and new disease turned out to be radiation sickness and tens of thousands more died.  This was pooh-poohed or covered up by American officials and the media, along with historic film footage.  See my book Atomic Cover-up.
***

SAN FRANCISCO, Aug. 23 (UP)— Japanese broadcasts today said atomic bomb raids on the cities of Hiroshima and Nagaski had cost nearly half a million "casualties and sufferers" from leveled buildings within a radius up to 10 miles.

Radio Tokyo, in broadcasts recorded by United Press, said effects of the bomb were "monstrous,"

The second atomic bomb dropped August 9 on Nagasaki took a toll of "more than 10,000 persons killed, more than 20,000 wounded and more than 90,000 rendered homeless in the city," Tokyo said."

"Furthermore many persons are dying daily from burns sustained during the course of the raids," a Tokyo propaganda broadcast said.

More than 60,000 were killed in Hiroshima August 6, Tokyo said, and "the number of dead are mounting as many of those who received burns cannot survive their wounds because of the effects the atomic bomb produce on the human body.

Even those who. received minor burns," one broadcast asserted, "looked quite healthy at first, only to weaken after a few days for some unknown reason and frequently die." Since the explosion of the atomic bomb affected an area 30 kilometers in diameter and practically allhouses in this area were either blown up, knocked down or reduced by fire, it is difficult to count all the dead bodies, many of which burned under collapsed buildings.

One hundred thousand were wounded and .200,000 "rendered homeless" at Hiroshima, where the world's first atomic bomb dropped in a parachute cradle to explode .a terrific whirlpool of energy whose immediate effects were felt for 10 minutes.

JFK Assassination: New Hollywood Version

Official trailer just out for Parkland, produced by Tom Hanks, with Billy Bob Thornton as Secret Service official, Zac Efron as doctor who worked on JFK in hospital,  Paul Giamatti as Mr. Zapruder.  Debuting as Toronto Film Fest.  Okay, Tom, now make movie on my book Joy In Mudville, which you optioned years ago!

'Dream,' Baby

Dean "The Dream" Meminger from some of the great old Knicks teams has died.  Robert Ward, who used to write for me at Crawdaddy and went on to a very successful career writing novels and TV scripts and again now a friend has a wonderful story about Dean just up at Facebook:

My pal Dean "The Dream" Meminger who I played basketball with three days a week at the YMHA on the Upper East Side of New York died today. He was an All American at Marquette, a great defensive specialist on the World Champion Knicks. We played in a morning game at the Y and often ran on the same team.

After the main game he and I and his teammate Hawthorne Wingo would hang out and play three on three with anyone hanging around. Dean could score any time he wanted but was generous and fed me the ball. At first I would lob passes to Wingo who could jump out of the gym. But one day he looked at me and said:"You shoot. I bound." I got it. He needed to practice bounding since that's how he stayed on the Knicks. Dean gets the ball, passes to me and they want me to shoot! This was a gunner's dream come true. I shot, missed Hawthorne bounded and threw the ball back out to me to shoot again. It became embarrassing. I gave the ball back to Dean who would shoot and make EVERY shot.

On same days after everyone else left Dean and I would play one on one. He was two inches taller than me and nine million times better so we made up our own rules. 1. He had to shoot outside the three point line. (Or outside the circle, as I'm not sure they had three pointers yet) 2. He could rebound his ball but still had to run back outside. No put backs. With these rules firmly in place we started out. I was a good shooter and if left alone I could hit shots. Dean left me open and I hit eight shots in a row in a game of fifteen. I could hear a happy little inner voice singing inside my head:"Bobby Ward is going to beat a world champion Knicks player at one on one." Then I missed. Dean got the ball and with me draped all over him made fifteen three pointers in a row. At the end I was laughing and tackling him as he shot and he still made them all. He looked at me and said, "Good try Bobby."

He was a lovable and wonderful guy who everyone at the Y loved. His life was fouled up by drugs and the usual suspects but he was a dear pal and a buddy to all the guys who played with him. In our games he was generous, and would much rather pass than shoot. RIP Dream. No one who knew you will ever forget you.

UPDATE: Sgt. Bales, Mass Killer, Will Serve More Time Than Manning

UPDATE  Well, that's relief.  Bales gets life without parole, vs. 35 years for Manning.  Still.

Earlier:  Far from the courtroom in Virginia where a judge will decide Pfc. Bradley Manning's fate today or tomorrow--the government officially asked for a 60-year sentence yesterday--another sentencing procedure has begun.  It's out in the state of Washington and the Army man in trouble in this case is Staff Sgt. Robert Bales.  Oh, you remember him, he pleaded guilty (to avoid the death penalty) to killing 16 innocent Afghans, mainly women and children.  Prosecutors promise to play a tape of his phone chat with his wife where they laughed about the charges. Still, it's not inconceivable that his sentence will be no longer, and possibly less, than the one for Manning, if that latter does indeed get virtually life in prison.  The worst case scenario for Bales still makes him eligible for parole in 20 years.

After the killing, the U.S. had to halt operations in the country for weeks, and there were many other ill effects--far more than documented in the Manning case, it seems.

Ronstadt Discloses Parkinson's

Singer Linda Ronstadt has performed little for years and now discloses that she is suffering fro Parkinson's.  She had previously thought it was the result of a tick bite and shoulder injury.  Now she can't sing a note, gets around on wheelchair when travels.  Sad.  Her bio coming next month but this is not in there.  From happier times, when she was one of top stars of 1970s in any genre.  Below that, a painfully young and nervous Linda in 1969 (maybe she just realized her skirt was too short) with Johnny Cash.

New Edition of Our Book About Manning and Trial Published Tonight

Through the miracle of modern publishing, a new, updated and expanded edition of the book I wrote with Kevin Gosztola, Truth and Consequences: The U.S. vs. Private Manning has been published tonight, in its e-book version (the print update has to wait a bit).  It now covers the case through the close of the trial, the verdict and yesterday's sentencing--and the reactions to all of it.  Gosztola, of course, is one of only three or four journalists who were there for the many months of hearings and then the trial.  Here's the new write-up from the Amazon book page.
***
"Greg Mitchell and Kevin Gosztola have provided, from the start, some of the most important coverage of WikiLeaks and Bradley Manning. They have shone a bright light on Manning’s courageous whistle-blowing and brutal incarceration--and now in this timely and vital book they raise many serious questions surrounding all of that, and the new legal maneuvers against him." -- DANIEL ELLSBERG

The first book of its kind, "Truth and Consequences" is now published in an updated and expanded August 2013 edition that covers Pfc. Manning's recent trial, conviction, and sentencing. It probes not just the life and worldwide impact of Manning, the U.S. Army private accused of leaking classified information to WikiLeaks, but also the controversial legal proceedings against him. This dramatic and often surprising saga--the only book to follow the entire story from the first leak to the close of the trial--is written by the two reporters who have followed his case, from the beginning, more closely than virtually any other journalists.

This e-book for Kindle, iPads and other devices--also available in a June 2013 print edition--could not be more timely. Manning now faces more than thirty years in prison for charges related to leaking documents and videos to WikiLeaks.

"Truth and Consequences" is written by award-winning author Greg Mitchell, whose daily blog on WikiLeaks for The Nation magazine and numerous books have gained a wide following, and Kevin Gosztola, who writes for a popular blog at Firedoglake.com, "The Dissenter." Gosztola was one of the few reporters to attend all of the key hearings and the entire trial, starting in December 2011.

The new edition includes a compelling account of the trial, verdict and sentencing, and the strong critical reaction and protest from activists, journalists and other observers.

The book traces Manning from his childhood in Oklahoma to Baghdad, where he was arrested in May 2010 and charged with sending to WikiLeaks explosive secret reports relating to the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, and diplomatic cables exposing sensitive U.S. relations around the world--all of it long kept from the public. Then the authors probe the controversy that swirled around Manning's harsh treatment in the brig at the Marine base in Quantico, Va., and demonstrations all over the world -- even as some pundits and politicians in the U.S. called for Manning's execution.

The book then follows the Manning case right up to his trial and responses to the August 21, 2013, sentencing. 

'NYT' Thrown for Loop by Manning Change?

As swell public editor Margaret Sullivan explains, NYT editors thrown into a bit of tizzy this morning by the Bradley-to-Chelsea name change.   She goes to the copy desk and style manual and quotes folks, who seem to suggest the name change will "evolve"--still use Bradley but maybe often mention the switch.  Sullivan seems to back making switch and citing Bradley also for awhile.

The Motor City Is Burning

The great John Lee Hooker, 1967, based on a true story... "The Big D."  Sorry young 'uns, they don't make 'em like this anymore.

Cumberbatch Protests

The Sherlock star is appearing soon in yet another controversial WikiLeaks movie--playing Julian Assange.  But he's also been speaking out on political issues, releasing statements on human rights, and holding up signs on the set of Sherlock.  At left he critiques the UK for detaining Glenn Greenwald's spouse. 

Two Papers Hit Manning Sentence

The two newspapers that carried more of the material he leaked than any others both now call the sentence Bradley Manning received (thirty-five years) way out of bounds.

NYT editorial calls Manning sentence "excessive.... by any standard."  And adds:  "But the larger issue, which is not resolved by Private Manning’s sentencing, is the federal government’s addiction to secrecy and what it will do when faced with future leaks, an inevitability when 92 million documents are classified in a year and more than 4 million Americans have security clearance."

 Editorial at The Guardian:

Mr Manning, according to this logic, did more harm than the soldier who gave a Jordanian intelligence agent information on the build-up to the first Iraq war, or the marine who gave the KGB the identities of CIA agents and floor plans of the embassies in Moscow and Vienna. Mr Manning did three times as much harm in transmitting to WikiLeaks in 2010 the war logs or field reports from Iraq and Afghanistan, as Charles Graner did. He was the army reserve corporal who became ringleader of the Abu Ghraib abuse ring and was set free after serving six and a half years of his 10-year sentence.

Pfc. Manning's Statements

UPDATE  The Army will not offer hormone therapy as requested by Pfc. Manning. Today quotes statement:  "Inmates at the United States Disciplinary Barracks and Joint Regional Correctional Facility are treated equally regardless of race, rank, ethnicity or sexual orientation. All inmates are considered soldiers and are treated as such with access to mental health professionals, including a psychiatrist, psychologist, social workers and behavioral science noncommissioned officers with experience in addressing the needs of military personnel in pre- and post-trial confinement....

"The Army does not provide hormone therapy or sex-reassignment surgery for gender identity disorder.   The USDB has implemented risk assessment protocols and safety procedures to address high risk factors identified with the Prison Rape Elimination Act."


Earlier today:  Pfc. Manning released another statement via attorney David Coombs on the Today show just now, including:  “I am Chelsea Manning. I am female.  Given the way that I feel, and have felt since childhood, I want to begin hormone therapy as soon as possible. I hope that you will support me in this transition.... I also request that, starting today, you refer to me by my new name and use the feminine pronoun (except in official mail to the confinement facility). I look forward to receiving letters from supporters and having the opportunity to write back.”  Manning again thanked supporters and signed the note, "Chelsea E. Manning." Attorney said he expects Manning to be paroled in seven years but still hopes for pardon before then.

Released via  attorney on Wednesday:

The decisions that I made in 2010 were made out of the concern for my country and the wrold that we live in. Since the tragic events of 9/11, our country has been at war. We have been at war with an enemy that chooses not to meet us on a traditional battlefield. Due to this fact, we’ve had to alter our methods of combatting the risk posed to us and our way of life.

I initially agreed with these methods and chose to volunteer to help defend our country. It was not until I was in Iraq and reading secret military reports on a daily basis that I started to question the morality of what we were doing. It was at this time that I realized that our efforts to meet the risk posed to us by the enemy, we had forgotten our humanity

We consciously elected to devalue life both in Iraq and Afghanistan. When we engaged those that we perceived were the enemy, we sometimes killed innocent civilians.

Whenever we killed innocent civilians, instead of accepting responsibility for our conduct, we elected to hide behind the veil of national security and classified information in order to avoid any public accountability.

In our zeal to kill the enemy, we internally debated the definition of torture. We held individuals at Guantanamo for years without due process. We inexplicably turned a blind eye to torture and executions by the Iraqi government. And we stomached countless other acts in the name of our war on terror.

Patriotism is often the cry extolled when morally questionable acts are advocated by those in power. When these cries of patriotism any logically-based dissension, it is usually an American soldier that is given the order to carry out some ill-conceived mission.

Our nation has had similar dark moments for the virtues of democracy—the Trail of Tears, the Dred Scott decision, McCarthyism and the Japanese-American internment camps—to mention a few. I am confident that many of the actions since 9/11 will one day be viewed in a similar light.

As the late Howard Zinn once said, there is not a flag large enough to cover the shame of killing innocent people.

I understand that my actions violated the law. I regret that my actions hurt anyone or harmed the United States. It was never my intent to hurt anyone. I only wanted to help people. When I chose to disclose classified information, I did so out of a love for my country and my sense of duty to others.

If you deny my request for a pardon, I will serve my request knowing that some time you have to pay a heavy price to live in a free society. I will gladly pay that price if it means we could have a country that is truly conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all women and men are created equal.

Nixon's Last Tapes

It's dirty work but someone's got to do it.  You may have heard that the final trove of Nixon's infamous tapes were released today at the Nixon Library, with very little descriptive to help researchers.  Well, the Atlantic Wire plunged in, and offers this partial report.   They say there's more on Watergate but they stick pretty much to Nixon in his classic Jew-hating, and black-mocking mode.   So we've got him damning an aide's "Jewish soul" and saying blacks will never run Jamaica well for a 100 or 1000 years.  And those little black kids don't like him much (for some reason).  Surely more to come.   I should not that I was the very first researcher to use the library, even before it opened, doing some digging for my Nixon-Douglas book.

Man Who Brought Beatles to USA Dies

Sid Bernstein helped launch "The British Invasion," and later brought Beatles back for final appearance here, at Shea (see below).  During the '70s, we repeatedly covered Bernstein, at Crawdaddy, as he made calls for the Beatles to re-form (with his help). 

Kurt Vonnegut Meets Kilgore Trout

Here's a second excerpt from my new e-book, Vonnegut and Me: Conversations and Close Encounters of the Weird Kind.  (First excerpt here.)   One feature of the book is the full text of my epic 1974 profile for Crawdaddy, which Vonnegut at the time hailed as the best piece written about him.  I'd interviewed him in New York, then mixed actual quotes from that with a fanciful reunion of his most famous characters--all under the byline of Kilgore Trout.  Here's a very small part of it.
**
by Kilgore Trout

I had to be at the Hilton for the symposium at 3 o'clock; the others wouldn't be arriving at Vonnegut's until 2:30. I welcomed the opportunity to spend some time alone with my Creator and didn't feel all that bad that I wouldn't get a chance to fool around with my fellow former slaves -- even though Eliot Rosewater, for instance, was one of my biggest fans.

What were we doing walking around with all that free will? Vonnegut had explained the motivation behind his dramatic Emancipation Proclamation in his latest book, Breakfast of Champions.

"As I approached my fiftieth birthday," he wrote, "I had become more and more enraged and mystified by the idiot decisions made by my countrymen. And then I had come suddenly to pity them, for I understood how innocent and natural it was for them to behave so abominably, with such abominable results: They were doing their best to live like people invented in story books. This was the reason Americans shot each other so often: It was a convenient literary device for ending short stories and books.

"Why were so many Americans treated by their government as though their lives were as disposable as paper facial tissues? Because that was the way authors customarily treated bit-part players in their made-up tales.

"Once I understood what was making America such a dangerous, unhappy nation of people who had nothing to do with real life," Vonnegut continued, "I resolved to shun storytelling. I would write about life."

And he promised: "I'm not going to put on any more puppet shows."

So the Creator had cut the strings on his dancing dolls. "I won't be needing them anymore," he told one interviewer. "They can pursue their own destinies. I guess that means I'm free to pursue my destiny, too."

So there I was, sleeping in dirty movie houses and walking down East 48th Street, pursuing my own destiny.

Since Vonnegut no longer needed me, I was free to write for anyone: reputable publishers, publishers of beaver books -- anyone. At that moment, in fact, I was considering ways I could turn that afternoon's gathering into a big-deal magazine article for a certain national magazine.

I was only a half block from my Creator, and slowing down. I wondered if he would recognize me. Since our previous meeting, my hair had gotten thinner on top and greyer on the sides, and I had shaved my scraggly white beard. Still, there were these distinguishing features: I am snaggle-toothed and missing the top joint of my right ring finger.

Vonnegut did that to me, incidentally. He had me born snaggle-toothed, and had Dwayne Hoover bite off the top of my finger at the end of Breakfast of Champions. Hoover had done that because of something he had read in a book, Now It Can Be Told. I wrote that book.

Vonnegut had also given me a tremendous wang. You never know who'll get one.

There I was in front of his four-floor Victorian brownstone, where he had moved within the past month from another location ten blocks away, with his lady-friend, whom I shall call Ellen.  West Barnstable, Cape Cod, where he had constructed me and most of his other puppets, was now four years in his distant past. I rang the bell and within seconds, Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. was at the door.

"Here I am," I offered.

"So glad you are," he said, taking my bag.

He spoke twangily and his smile went on and on. He's a sweet old poop, a big man, six-feet-three, broad shoulders, no hips, no belly, less of the bear of a man I had remembered from our previous, brief meeting on a dark night. His hair had been trimmed, also.

"Mr. Trout -- Kilgore," he began to say, ushering me into the apartment, when suddenly somewhere a big dog barked.

Vonnegut's diffident bloodhound Lope appeared at the entrance to the living room. I recoiled. I'm scared to death of dogs. Vonnegut shooed him away.

"I got him from my brother," he said, confidentially. "He has to fight all the time because he can't wag his tail."

He introduced me to Ellen, a pale, dark-haired woman in her early 30s who was busy unpacking boxes. They had just moved in.

"It's a nice cozy house you have here," I said, and it really was.

"It takes a heap of living," Vonnegut said, "to make a house a home."

The room was bare but for the black leather couch we sat on, a glass coffee table alongside and shelves of books against two walls.  Vonnegut was dressed in terribly baggy but good tweed pants, a green V-neck sweater and brown hush puppies.

"What are you doing now, my old friend?" he asked, his dark eyebrows shooting up and his lips breaking into a really fine grin. He had left me in Cohoes, New York, installing aluminum storm windows and screens. Before that he had made me circulation man for the Ilium Gazette -- made me bully, and flatter and cheat little delivery boys.

I told him I was back at the job he'd made me leave a decade before at a stamp redemption center in Hyannis, Massachusetts. "Think of the sacrilege of a Jesus figure redeeming stamps," I said, softly.