Just wanted to give y’all a heads-up on this event tonight, brought to my attention by my friend and fellow Capital City Club member Clare Morris:
MEDIA ADVISORY: Boston Marathon Bombing Fundraiser at the Capital City Club Tonight
The public is invited
What: The Capital City Club is sponsoring cocktails and fun for charity, featuring Celebrity Bartender Dr. Frank Clark. Dr. Clark, an avid runner and Columbia resident, finished the Boston Marathon in 2 hours and 57 minutes.
Frank’s special drink for the evening is Sam Adams Boston Lager. All Sam Adams Boston Lagers and Club brand drinks are $4.00. Complimentary hors d’oeuvres will be served.
When: Tuesday, May 14, 2013 5:30 to 7:00 pm
Where: The Capital City Club Lounge, 25th floor, Capital Center, 1201 Main St., Columbia
I’m going to drop by, and it would be great to see some of y’all there. As Clare said, the public is invited, so you don’t have to be a member. (Of course, if you’d like to become a member, I’ll be more than happy to help you with that.)
I like the way Clare worked Dr. Clark’s finishing time into the release. Aside from the horrific events of that day, I find his athletic achievement impressive.
There’s a scene in “Bananas” in which Woody Allen’s character is discussing the economy of his new, adopted country, and when he’s told that bananas are its greatest export, he cries, “Bananas, bananas!” in a tone that conveys that he’s heard enough about that particular fruit. (I tried to find a video clip of that, but couldn’t. And is it my imagination that that movie used to be available on Netflix, but is not now?)
There were times in recent months when many of us would have a similar reaction to Lindsey Graham’s (and John McCain’s, and Kelly Ayotte’s) repetition of the word, “Benghazi.”
Subsequent events have indicated that further inquiry into what happened there last Sept. 11 is at least worth further investigation. There should be bipartisan agreement on that much. Unfortunately, it seems unlikely that any investigation that involves the Congress will be tainted by consideration of the 2016 presidential election, and the anticipated candidacy of Hilary Clinton.
For that reason, I though it particularly unfortunate that Lindsey Graham should say, just as everyone is finally paying attention, the following:
If it had been known by the American people seven weeks before the election the truth about Benghazi, I think it would have made a difference in the election…
No, it wouldn’t have. You still would have had Barack Obama going up against Mitt Romney, and the outcome would have been the same. It’s hard to imagine any sort of statement that might have been made about Benghazi. I mean, really, what would it have been? Are you saying the president should have said, “I’ve done a rotten job of protecting the American people, because I just don’t care. I could have saved the ambassador, but I personally decided not to, because I just didn’t like him. And I’ll do it the same way next time…”
It was a terrorist attack in a politically unstable place where there are tremendous numbers of weapons circulating, and it ended tragically. It should cause us to review consulate security across the globe. That’s the “truth about Benghazi,” and if the administration had said that on day one, and continued to say it through the election, I see no way it would have affected the election outcome.
Anyway, you and your fellow senators were being heard as you cried in the wilderness about this topic, before the election. But you were being dismissed by some as Republicans who were trying to wring electoral advantage from the tragedy. So… why would you want to give credence to that by saying something like this?
Jim DeMint, former far-right kingmaker, isn’t getting a lot of respect in his new role at the Heritage Foundation — even among conservatives.
Earlier this week, he put out a report suggesting that immigration reform as envisioned by the Gang of Eight will cost the country $6.3 trillion. The report is, quite understandably, ridiculed and excoriated on the left. But conservatives, people DeMint would once have counted as allies, aren’t very positively impressed either.
The Heritage Foundation on Monday released a report designed to kill immigration reform. A few days later, nearly 30 leaders, hailing from the core of the conservative movement—think tanks, faith groups, political and advocacy organizations—signed a public letter backing the congressional process. Which got more notice?
The media glory in conflict, and so they devoted this week to the angry feud/war/battle in the GOP over immigration reform. The evidence? One research document from one think tank. The real news is the growing unity among conservative leaders and groups over the need to at least embrace the challenge of reform. This is no 2007.
At the height of that past fray over immigration—as restrictionists whipped up seething grass-roots anger against reform, drowning out proponents—Heritage released a similar report. It fueled a raging fire, and played a singular role in derailing reform…
Very interesting. I don’t know to what extent this truly reflects a growing “conservative” consensus for sensible immigration reform, but it’s promising. (It would also be good news for Lindsey Graham for next year, although the DeMint faction in SC remains large.)
My own favorite comment on this general subject came more from the center-right — from David Brooks — earlier in the week. For him, it was a pretty scathing piece. An excerpt:
The opponents of immigration reform have many small complaints, but they really have one core concern. It’s about control. America doesn’t control its borders. Past reform efforts have not established control. Current proposals wouldn’t establish effective control.
But the opponents rarely say what exactly it is they are trying to control. They talk about border security and various mechanisms to achieve that, but they rarely go into detail about what we should be so vigilant about restricting. I thought I would spell it out.
First, immigration opponents are effectively trying to restrict the flow of conservatives into this country. In survey after survey, immigrants are found to have more traditional ideas about family structure and community than comparable Americans. They have lower incarceration rates. They place higher emphasis on career success. They have stronger work ethics. Immigrants go into poor neighborhoods and infuse them with traditional values.
When immigrant areas go bad, it’s not because they have infected America with bad values. It’s because America has infected them with bad values already present. So the first thing conservative opponents of reform are trying to restrict is social conservatism….
Does Esquire still do its Dubious Achievement Awards? (I ask because, though I was a subscriber back in the ’70s, I haven’t picked up a copy in many a year.)
The Federal Bureau of Investigation announced today that it has named Joanne Chesimard to its “Most Wanted Terrorists” list, with a $2 million reward being offered for her capture. Chesimard has the dubious distinction of being the first woman on the list, which has existed since 2001 and featured such notorious names as Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Osama bin Laden, Ayman al-Zawahiri, and Adam Gadahn. Chesimard, who was a member of a group called the Black Liberation Army, was named to the list 40 years to the day after she allegedly shot and killed a state trooper on the New Jersey Turnpike. “Joanne Chesimard is a domestic terrorist who murdered a law enforcement officer execution-style,” FBI Special Agent Aaron Ford said in a press release. “Today, on the anniversary of Trooper Werner Foerster’s death, we want the public to know that we will not rest until this fugitive is brought to justice.”…
Congratulations, ladies. Another barrier has fallen.
But I have to say, this smacks of tokenism to me. Talk about your diligent affirmative action — reaching back 40 years? There must be scores of deserving, better-qualified male terrorists out there who would just love a crack at this kind of recognition, guys who’ve been very busy keeping their resumes current with far-more-recent acts of mayhem, but they’ve been passed over.
I’ll bet some of them are really going to be ticked when they see this.
Earlier today, I heard Kevin Cullen of The Boston Globe on the radio, giving a riveting, shot-by-shot description of the gun battle between Boston-area cops and the Tsarnaev brothers last Thursday night. It’s a great story, and Cullen tells it well in his column this morning. In fact, I don’t recall ever having read a more compelling story about cops in action in a newspaper. An excerpt:
Joe Reynolds is a young cop in Watertown, and last Friday he was driving, alone in his cruiser, when he saw them.
The bombing suspects.
Tamerlan Tsarnaev and his brother Dzhokhar were in two cars, following each other closely.
Reynolds called it in.
Do not engage, the dispatcher told him. Not on your own.
The brothers pulled over. So did Reynolds. He didn’t know it, but he was about to interrupt the two as they tried, police believe, to transfer their crude, homemade explosives from one vehicle to another.
As Reynolds waited for backup, it felt like hours, but it was only minutes and that backup, in the form of Sergeant John MacLelland, was speeding up the street just as the Tsarnaevs turned and at least one of them opened up on Joe Reynolds. Reynolds threw his cruiser into reverse and sped backwards. He and MacLelland got out and began returning fire.
The suspects had to know they had only one chance if they were going to make their way to New York, perhaps to kill again. They had to shoot their way out. But the cavalry was on the way to ensure that would not happen. A bevy of Watertown, Boston, Transit, and State Police were rushing to help….
It’s not quite the same as hearing it in Cullen’s accent. But just pretend that when he writes “cops,” you’re hearing “cawps.” That will help…
BOSTON (AP) — The surviving suspect in the Boston Marathon bombings acknowledged to the FBI his role in the attacks but did so before he was advised of his constitutional right to keep quiet and seek a lawyer, U.S. officials said Wednesday.
Once Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was read his rights on Monday, he immediately stopped talking, according to four officials of both political parties who were briefed on the interrogation but insisted on anonymity because the briefing was private.
After roughly 16 hours of questioning, investigators were surprised when a magistrate judge and a representative from the U.S. Attorney’s office entered the hospital room and read Tsarnaev his rights, the four officials and one law enforcement official said. Investigators had planned to keep questioning him…
Authorities say they have more than enough evidence without a confession, but they no longer have a font of information on the Tsarnaev brother’s actions, plans or associations.
Which sort of makes this a perfect way of raising yet again the question which so divides the left and right of the political spectrum: Should terrorism be treated as a crime, with emphasis on what it takes to get a conviction, or should we shove prosecutorial considerations aside in order to get information to prevent future attacks?
In a way, we got both approaches here, and perhaps the best of both: A few days of interrogation that led to a preliminary conclusion that the brothers acted without confederates and that now that one is dead and the other in custody, there’s no further danger. Now, the prosecutors can do their thing.
And maybe that’s the way to do it. But I’m sure some would argue that he should have heard his Miranda rights immediately, while others would like to have him continuing to sing to investigators. The latter seems the preference of our own Lindsey Graham, according to Politico:
… Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), who had been calling for Tsarnaev to be tried as an enemy combatant rather than as a criminal, on Thursday slammed Attorney General Eric Holder and said he sympathized with the FBI.
“This is the Eric Holder crowd basically refusing to embrace interrogation techniques available to us to make us safe,” he said on “America Live with Megyn Kelly.” After reiterating that Tsarnaev should have earned enemy combatant designation, Graham added, “I know that the FBI agent and the counter terrorism experts have to be incredibly frustrated that they could not continue to interview this suspect about what awaits us as a nation. This was a big mistake.”
As the faux-conservative Colbert Reporthost, Stephen Colbert has lampooned campaign finance laws and the U.S. electoral system by starting his own super PAC and announcing bids for the presidency and “the president of the United States of South Carolina.” But another Colbert—this one with a hard t at the end—is also vying for the political spotlight: Elizabeth Colbert Busch, Stephen’s older sister, who’s facing off against avid Appalachian Trail hiker and former South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford in a May 7 special election for South Carolina’s 1st Congressional District. Colbert has twicedevoted show segments to his sister’s campaign, including one endorsing her candidacy, and has mocked Sanford on countless occasions. With the show’s nightly viewership of 1.5 million and the documented “Colbert bump” in a politician’s support after an appearance, is Colbert violating election laws by blending his hosting role with his sister’s campaign?
Probably not. The central law in play is the Federal Communications Commission’s equal-time rule. Beginning with the Radio Act of 1927, which Congress enacted in response to fears of broadcasters’ ability to sway elections by limiting a candidate’s access to the airwaves, radio and television networks have been required to offer equal airtime (or opportunities to purchase advertising at a reduced price) to all candidates if they request it. Exemptions were later added for documentaries, newscasts, news interviews, and on-the-spot news events.
Since it covers news stories and political issues, TheColbert Report would likely fall under the newscast or news interviews exceptions…
Really? I would have thought it was entertainment.
In any case, I’ve always found the equal-time rule sort of hard to follow. And now that we have “news shows” that are entirely satire, how would you go about giving equal time, anyway? And if you gave it, how could you be assured it would be to the advantage of the one demanding it? When everything is dealt with ironically, how do you make sure your equal time is quality time? Make it an infomercial, so you have total control? Maybe. I don’t know. But even that could backfire, as Comedy Central viewers go there for smart-aleck, not for earnest.
Boston Marathon bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was charged today with using a weapon of mass destruction in the April 15 attacks that ripped through a crowd at the finish line of the world-renowned race, killing three people and injuring scores of others
Tsarnaev’s initial court appearance was conducted today by a federal magistrate judge in his hospital room, said Gary H. Wente, circuit executive for the federal courts in the First Circuit. Tsarnaev was able to respond to inquiries, nodding or mouthing yes or no, according to a person familiar with the proceedings in the room…
I realize that the law can have definitions that don’t necessarily match the ones we use out in the real world. But if those pressure-cooker bombs were WMDs, then we found plenty of them in Iraq. Every one one of those IEDs built from artillery shells would qualify.
Usually, we make a distinction between such conventional weapons and weapons of mass destruction, which in a military sense refers equally to nuclear, chemical and biological weapons.
The actual bomb Tsarnaev allegedly constructed and detonated is pretty much the opposite of what people think about when they think “weapon of mass destruction,” a vague term that usually means a weapon carrying an unconventional payload, like a nuclear, chemical or biological yield. The FBI affiant, Special Agent Daniel Genck, confirms the bombs used pressure cookers for their hulls — “of the same brand” — packed with “low grade explosive” containing BBs and nails and a “green hobby fuse.”
Bashar Assad’s chemical arsenal this ain’t. But, as Danger Room explained after U.S. citizen and anti-Assad fighter Eric Harroun, faced similar charges, “weapon of mass destruction” is a very broad category under federal law. Grenades, mines, missiles and rockets all apply. So do homemade bombs of the sort Tsarnaev allegedly constructed. About all that doesn’t apply are firearms and pyrotechnics gear. No one ever said the law had to coincide with military terminology.
It’s an interesting choice for an initial charge. Not murder or accessory to murder. Not resisting arrest. I’m going to be interested to learn more about this prosecutorial decision…
There’s been a lot of overwrought reaction to Lindsey Graham’s suggestion that Dzhokhar Tsarnaev should be tried by military tribunal rather than under our criminal system.
For instance, there was this writer over at Forbes who moaned, “Why is it that those who spend an inordinate amount of time professing their dedication and fealty to the United States Constitution seem to always be among the first to toss our founding document out the window the moment it becomes inconvenient to their desires?”
Which is a grossly unfair mischaracterization of Lindsey Graham and what he said.
The reason you see some repetition in those Tweets is that Graham was responding to comments by others, and reiterating points.
As it happened, so far Graham’s wishes have been followed — the prisoner has not been Mirandized, and apparently has been interrogated to the extent that his wounds (he was shot in the throat) will allow. It is not necessary to consider him an “enemy combatant” to withhold the Miranda warnings, under the public safety exemption — in other words, to gather the intelligence that Sen. Graham values.
As to his being considered an “enemy combatant” — well that’s a war of words that Republicans have been carrying on with Democrats for 12 years now. Republicans prefer the rules of war; Democrats prefer to treat terrorism as a cops-and-robbers thing.
This case seems to be to dwell in sort of a twilight area — and arguments to treat it as war and as crime both seem to have some legitimacy.
Tsarnaev — the one who still lives — is a citizen. And not a citizen off in Yemen somewhere working with al Qaeda, whom President Obama might kill with a drone (just to help us remember that Democrats, too, have gone far beyond the bounds of due process in pursuing what can only be called a war — else there’s no justification for such actions). He’s a citizen who went bad like the Columbine killers.
His brother’s recent fascination with radical Islamism does suggest something that fits within the “War on Terror,” but I think we need to see more evidence that these attacks were somehow coordinated with a hostile foreign organization before we consider this something other than a mass murder. Perhaps such evidence will emerge.
When he is criminally prosecuted on state and federal charges, I wonder if there will be a charge — along with multiple counts of murder and many more of attempted murder — having to do with bringing Boston to a halt? I wonder what that cost, in terms of lost economic activity. This is on my mind after reading about the guy who we are told ran off naked on acid, and all the resources devoted to trying to find him. How much more did the Tsarnaev brothers cost the city, state and federal governments, plus untold thousands of businesses?
But I digress. By the way, while I was traveling over the weekend — driving to Memphis and back for a wedding — Bryan Caskey already did a post on this subject, which you might want to check out.
The national Republican Party has washed its hands of Mark Sanford — but the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee is firmly in the corner of his opponent, Elizabeth Colbert-Busch,
As evidenced by the ad above.
Meanwhile, some Republicans seem to be worrying about their association with Sanford even if he wins. The concern seems to be that he would further damage their reputation with women, either way.
In that vein I share the below interview with Steve Moore of the Wall Street Journal’s editorial board.
BOSTON — The two suspects in the Boston Marathon bombings led police on a wild and deadly chase through the suburbs here early Friday morning that ended in the death of one of the suspects as well as a campus police officer; the other suspect remained at large while hundreds of police officers conduct a manhunt through Watertown, about five miles west of downtown Boston.
The one police identify as Dzhokhar A. Tsarnaev, at large.
The surviving suspect was identified as Dzhokhar A. Tsarnaev, 19, of Cambridge, Mass., a law enforcement official said. Investigators believe that that both of the suspects were Chechens, a law enforcement official said….
The pursuit began after 10 p.m. Thursday when two men robbed a 7/11 near Central Square in Cambridge. A security camera caught a man identified as one of the suspects, wearing a gray hoodie.
About 10:30, police received reports that a campus security officer at M.I.T. was shot while he sat in his police cruiser. He was found with multiple gunshot wounds, according to a statement issued by Middlesex Acting District Attorney Michael Pelgro, Cambridge Police Commissioner Robert Haas, and MIT Police Chief John DiFava. The officer was taken to Massachusetts General Hospital, where he was pronounced dead.
A short time later, police received reports of an armed carjacking of a Mercedes SUV by two males in the area of Third Street in Cambridge, the statement said. “The victim was carjacked at gunpoint by two males and was kept in the car with the suspects for approximately a half hour,” the statement said. He was later released, uninjured, at a gas station on Memorial Drive in Cambridge. …
One report I saw they just killed the MIT officer execution-style, no chance.
What sequence of events has loosed mad, bloodthirsty Chechen brothers onto the streets of Boston?
I’m going to be traveling today but will try to check in. Y’all have at it…
National Republicans are pulling the plug on Mark Sanford’s suddenly besieged congressional campaign, POLITICO has learned — a potentially fatal blow to the former South Carolina governor’s dramatic comeback bid.
Blindsided by news that Sanford’s ex-wife has accused him of trespassing and concluding he has no plausible path to victory, the National Republican Congressional Committee has decided not to spend more money on Sanford’s behalf ahead of the May 7 special election.
National Republicans are pulling the plug on Mark Sanford’s suddenly besieged congressional campaign, POLITICO has learned — a potentially fatal blow to the former South Carolina governor’s dramatic comeback bid.
Blindsided by news that Sanford’s ex-wife has accused him of trespassing and concluding he has no plausible path to victory, the National Republican Congressional Committee has decided not to spend more money on Sanford’s behalf ahead of the May 7 special election.
Ow. That’s gotta hurt.
I’m starting to think that in spite of that being a GOP seat since 1980, and despite the district being even more Republican after the last reapportionment, Elizabeth Colbert Busch now has a very real chance of winning.
While I was at home having a late lunch, the following bulletins came on my phone in rapid succession:
AP Mobile: Breaking (1:41PM EDT): Law enforcement official: Arrest imminent in marathon bombing, suspect to be brought to court.
WSJ: Suspect in Boston bombings about to be arrested, according to AP. WSJ can’t independently confirm.
NYTimes: Investigators Say They Have Video of Man Believed to Have Planted Bombs in Boston
AP Mobile: Breaking (2:02PM EDT): Law enforcement official: Boston Marathon bomb suspect in custody, expected in federal court.
And then just now, as I was typing this, the following:
AP Mobile: Breaking (2:47PM EDT): Federal officials deny that Boston Marathon bombing suspect is in custody.
OK, first, why on Earth would any law enforcement official say someone was about to be arrested when the suspect was not yet in custody? Do they suppose mad bombers don’t have smartphones? I mean, a guy doesn’t even need a police scanner these days to keep tabs on the cops at this rate.
And then, on that last bulletin — What the…? Does anyone, in the media or the law enforcement establishment, know what’s going on?
I meant to say something on the subject then, but didn’t get to it. Which is ironic. Cindi’s not even Catholic (OK, she’s a kind of Catholic; she’s Anglican — but not Roman Catholic).
Anyway, something came up to remind me of it this week — a story in the Anderson paper about religious leaders in SC pushing for Medicaid expansion — so I thought I’d go ahead now and share the bishop’s letter.
It is a letter that, unlike the pronouncements of our governor and the House leadership, makes all the sense in the world:
February 20, 2013
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
To be Christian means that we are concerned about the wellbeing and health of all people. God took on flesh to restore the integrity of broken and wounded humanity. Indeed, Jesus made healing of the sick central to his ministry. “He came to the world to make us fully human, to help us to realize our human dignity as creatures made in the image of God. He came to bring the fullness of life” (USCCB Pastoral Letter: Health and Health Care, Nov. 19, 1981).
Throughout the centuries, the Church has carried on the ministry of Jesus by establishing
hospitals and nurturing the apostolate to the sick in response to the needs of suffering people. Pope John XXIII included medical care as a basic right founded on the sanctity of human life in his encyclical, Pacem in Terris. Reaffirming this traditional concern for today, Pope Benedict XVI wrote that “Health is a precious good for the person and society to promote, conserve and protect, dedicating the means, resources and energies necessary so that more persons can enjoy it. Unfortunately, the problem still remains today of many populations of the world that do not have access to the necessary resources to satisfy fundamental needs, particularly in regard to health. It is necessary to work with greater commitment at all levels so that the right to health is rendered effective, favoring access to primary health care” (Benedict XVI: Message to the Pontifical Council for Health Care Ministry, Nov. 18, 2010).
The Catholic Bishops of the United States have consistently called for access to health care forall our citizens: “Our approach to health care is shaped by a simple but fundamental principle: ‘Every person has a right to adequate health care. This right flows from the sanctity of human life and the dignity that belongs to all human persons, who are made in the image of God.’ Health care is more than a commodity; it is a basic human right, an essential safeguard of human life and dignity” (USCCB Resolution: A Framework for Comprehensive Health Care Reform, June 18, 1993). While the Church’s call for access to health care reflects an application of the Gospel to a contemporary need and therefore reflects the urgency of the Gospel, determining how to implement such access is open to prudential judgments of how to make it happen most effectively. We must continually discern wise solutions to the challenges we face, solutions that are both economically and politically viable. In that task of discernment, however, we as Catholics bring time-honored principles of Catholic social teaching to inform our reflection.
The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) now being legally enacted in our
country is an attempt to bring health care access to a broader range of citizenry in the United States. It is not perfect. In fact, the U.S. Catholic Church is deeply concerned about mandates associated with aspects of the law that would require religious institutions to provide contraception coverage, asking us to violate a consistent position by the Church on this. There are also many concerns about how to rein in the costs of health care so that its expansion is affordable to our country. However, providing access to health care is consonant with Catholic social teaching. Indeed, it is more than consonant — it is called for by Catholic social teaching.
This spring, our South Carolina state legislature will consider whether to opt into the expansion of Medicaid as provided for by the Affordable Care Act. Persons eligible for Medicaid would be expanded by about three hundred thirty thousand more South Carolinians who live near the poverty line but previously have not been eligible. Key state-wide elected leaders and many in the General Assembly have voiced their opposition to this expansion. Leaders of our state’s hospitals, including Catholic hospitals, on the other hand, have endorsed this legislation. It will expand their ability not only to serve the poor of our state but to pay for those services. The State of South Carolina would be required to pay for ten percent of the total cost of this expansion after three years of full funding by the Federal Government. This will require us as a state to find the revenue to pay for this expansion. It will cost us.
Bearing a cost for the sake of something greater is the heart of our faith; it brought us salvation. At the same time, we can and must make this expansion and our whole healthcare system more effective and economically viable. If health care funding as envisioned by the Affordable Care Act is not perfect, we nevertheless are not powerless as a society to refine and make it more effective even as we implement it.
I write as your Bishop in noting the call of Catholic social teaching, and I appeal as a fellow
citizen in making a case for acceptance of Medicaid expansion by our state. I urge my fellow Catholics to study this issue and form your own prudential judgment on its wisdom. However, I ask that you start that evaluation with a presumption in favor of what the Church says is a good to be pursued in society, namely, the flourishing of all people through access to health care. Hold as well our faith conviction that shared sacrifice for a greater good and concern for the poor make us more like Christ. Make your views known to your legislators. For my part, I believe Medicaid expansion offers a step forward for South Carolina.
In the Lord’s Peace,
Most Reverend Robert E. Guglielmone
Bishop of Charleston
Y una mañana todo estaba ardiendo
y una mañana las hogueras
salían de la tierra
devorando seres,
y desde entonces fuego,
pólvora desde entonces,
y desde entonces sangre.
Bandidos con aviones y con moros,
bandidos con sortijas y duquesas,
bandidos con frailes negros bendiciendo
venían por el cielo a matar niños,
y por las calles la sangre de los niños
corría simplemente, como sangre de niños.
Victim Martin Richard, 8.
Chacales que el chacal rechazaría,
piedras que el cardo seco mordería escupiendo,
víboras que las víboras odiaran!
Frente a vosotros he visto la sangre
de España levantarse
para ahogaros en una sola ola
de orgullo y de cuchillos!
Generales
traidores:
mirad mi casa muerta,
mirad España rota:
pero de cada casa muerta sale metal ardiendo
en vez de flores,
pero de cada hueco de España
sale España,
pero de cada niño muerto sale un fusil con ojos,
pero de cada crimen nacen balas
que os hallarán un día el sitio
del corazón.
Preguntaréis por qué su poesía
no nos habla del sueño, de las hojas,
de los grandes volcanes de su país natal?
Venid a ver la sangre por las calles,
venid a ver
la sangre por las calles,
venid a ver la sangre
por las calles!
And here it is in English:
And one morning it was all burning, and one morning bonfires sprang out of the earth, devouring humans. And from then on, fire, gunpowder from then on, and from then on blood. Bandidos with planes and Moors, bandidos with rings and duchesses, bandidos with black friars signing the cross, coming down from sky to kill children. And in the streets, the blood of children ran simply like blood of children.
Jackals the jackals would despise, stones that the dry thistle would bite and bit on and spit out, vipers that the vipers would abominate. Facing you, I have seen the blood of Spain rise up to drown you in a single wave of pride and knives. Traitors, generals: look at my dead house, look at Spain broken: from every house, burning metal comes out instead of flowers, from every crater of Spain comes Spain, from every dead child comes a rifle with eyes, from every crime bullets are born that one day will find out in due the sight of the heart.
You will ask: why doesn’t his poetry speak to us of dreams, of leaves, of the great volcanoes of his native land? Come and see the blood in the streets, come and see the blood in the streets, come and see the blood in the streets.
In Neruda’s day, the threat was fascist government. Today, in the West, it’s deluded individuals and small groups of lunatics.
Two huge explosions rocked the Boston Marathon finish line at Copley Square just before 3 p.m. today, apparently causing numerous casualties.
“I saw two explosions. The first one was beyond the finish line. I heard a loud bang and I saw smoke rising,” said Herald reporter Chris Cassidy, who was running in the marathon.“I kept running and I heard behind me a loud bang. It looked like it was in a trash can or something. That one was in front of Abe and Louie’s. There are people who have been hit with debris, people with bloody foreheads.”
“There are at least a dozen that seem to be injured in some way,” Cassidy said.
Will this be the first successful terror attack in this country since 9/11/01? Or a gas main exploding? We’re still in those foggy first moments of developing news. Or developing history.
It’s coincidences like this that make people think there’s some sort of conspiracy among news media. The story on thestate.com this morning, from the NYT news service, was headlined, “Rubio offers full-throated support for immigration bill.”
On Tuesday, the bipartisan “Gang of Eight” is set to unveil a proposal that would represent the most far-reaching overhaul of immigration laws since 1986. The process of developing the legislation, which features a path to citizenship for up to 11 million immigrants who are in the country illegally, was hammered out in two dozen meetings led by veterans of earlier immigration battles, including Sens. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.), Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) and John McCain (R-Ariz.).
But in many ways, the senators’ negotiations, behind the scenes and in public, have hinged on a party of one. Rubio, the tea party favorite whose parents emigrated from Cuba, has been considered the most crucial player all along. Although he has seemed to waver at times, his full-throated endorsement of the bill Sunday, in a marathon round of seven television interviews, put at ease a group of colleagues who have been working hard to ensure he stays the course. I don’t know how full his throat was, but his calendar was certainly crowded on Sunday.
Sort of makes you think there was an emergency meeting of the Press Establishment yesterday, and “full-throated” would be the modifier of the week.
The chances are good that I, too, will be offering “full-throated” endorsement of the bill when it’s unveiled tomorrow. Partly because, as you know, if both Lindsey Graham and John McCain are for it, I have a tendency to agree. (When Joe Lieberman was in the Senate, and all three of them agreed on something, I was almost always with them — the big exception being health care policy.)
Beyond that, after months of work by this bipartisan group, the pragmatic truth is that politically speaking, whatever they have come up with is the best chance this country has to achieve comprehensive immigration reform. Whatever this one’s flaws may be, I can’t imagine where a better bill would come from. And the country is overdue to address this issue.
I have another rule of thumb — if both David Brooks and E.J. Dionne are for it, I usually am. And I heard them praising the effort on Friday, in a way that implied they’d had a look at the bill. In fact, I thought for a moment that I’d missed something in the news, since they were talking about it as though it were already out there.
But to return to where we started, the fact that Marco Rubio is so “full-throatedly” on board is a good sign that this will be something worth supporting. While McCain and Graham are taking a big political risk with this — Graham faces re-election next year, and as we know, there are elements in his party who despise him specifically for such things as this — for Rubio, the stakes are bigger. Everyone’s speaking of him as a presidential candidate for 2016 (on NPR this morning, they were talking about him being “the GOP’s Obama”).
Presidential ambitions would help explain why he would support something like this, as it helps move him and his party toward the center. It also presents a big risk, since he’s already alienated much of his base just by being one of the Gang of 8.
Which is why all the political talk shows wanted him yesterday.
Whatever happens with Rubio, though, here’s hoping that, after all this buildup, the Gang’s bill doesn’t disappoint.
Long before there was a Cher, or a Madonna, or a Sting, there was Annette, who preceded them all in needing no surname. Even “Elvis” had “Presley” attached more than Annette used “Funicello” in the early days.
That’s because she was the most famous of the Mouseketeers, and I mean the original, real Mouseketeers, not the latter-day imitations.
We expected the passing of Margaret Thatcher; that movie with Meryl Streep made it seem imminent. But Annette, leaving us at 70, was more of a shock.
I suspect you have to be almost exactly my age — one whose preschool years were entirely contained within the ’50s — to get this completely. Later, seeing her in the beach movies, I’d form another picture of her, and that one probably stuck better — that of a young woman rather than a child, although still a squeaky-clean image. (Alas, she was not my favorite character in those films; that honor belonged to Eric Von Zipper.)
John Updike used a passage, early in Rabbit Run, in which Harry “Rabbit” Angstrom watches the “The Mickey Mouse Club,” which comes across as a way of assuring us that this is, indeed, a quintessentially American novel. But Harry could never connect with the Mouseketeers the way we did. Harry was spoiled goods; he wasn’t one of us. Harry, in that and subsequent novels (OK, so I really only made it through Rabbit Redux before I gave up on him), was always too old for the cultural passages he was experiencing. Yet he plunged through them anyway, which for me imbued him with a certain falseness.
How did we get on Updike? Oh, yeah, Annette…
The Mouseketeers, Elvis, Mickey Mantle and Andy Devine were my first celebrities. It was years and years before I learned from Dumas there had been something in history called a musketeer, which at first looked to me like a misspelling.
Annette! If only once more we could see her standing by Jimmie as he led us through:
M-I-C (see you next week!)
K-E-Y (Why? Because we LIKE you!)
M-O-U-S-E
… and know, with a child’s certainty, that yes, we would see them next week, and that they did indeed like us as much as we liked them…
I’m really not terribly interested in whether President Obama’s compliment about California Attorney General Kamala Harris was “sexist.” After all these years, I’m still trying to figure out an accurate, consistent definition of the term. It seems to shift, depending on context.
Speaking at a fundraiser in a wealthy San Francisco suburb, President Obama praised the looks of California Attorney General Kamala Harris.
“You have to be careful to, first of all, say she is brilliant and she is dedicated and she is tough, and she is exactly what you’d want in anybody who is administering the law, and making sure that everybody is getting a fair shake,” Obama said. “She also happens to be, by far, the best looking attorney general in the country.”
“It’s true! C’mon,” he added, to laughter from the crowd…
And why did they laugh? Because most of the people in the crowd, male and female, had probably had more or less the same thought.
Coming from Obama, I take the remark as pretty benign. If it had come from Bill Clinton, I might react differently. Poor Obama — he’s seen as so aloof, so one time he tries to be a regular guy, to give an honest human reaction, even be gallant, and he ends up having to apologize for it. With Bill Clinton, the remark would be superfluous because we already knew he was a “regular guy” — and not in a good way.
And really, I want to hear from everyone on this. I’m not looking for the male reaction. Women are equally fine judges of pulchritude. I’m not looking for anything salacious or lascivious. I’m thinking more on the level of that episode of “Seinfeld” when George said of Joe DiMaggio, “Now that is a handsome man.”No, for once, I’d rather stay away from the value judgments, and ask a simple question: Was the president’s observation accurate?
When I started writing this post, I meant to link to a site that would show us all of the attorneys general. Unfortunately, the only link I’ve found that looks like it would enable us to do that doesn’t seem to be working. Maybe a lot of other people had the same thought, and overloaded the site — I don’t know.
I can say that, based on the photos I’ve looked at, she’s the best-looking attorney general I’ve ever seen. (Henry McMaster may have been tall and well-coiffed, but come on…) But I may have missed some unusually handsome examples of both genders; I must admit that.
I’m just trying to help the president out here, on the theory that truth is an effective defense…
