Fleeing Aleppo / Joseph Ceravolo: O carrion, o carrion

February 7, 2016, 1:26 am

≫ Next: The battle for Aleppo / animal rescue

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Life does not resemble life [Aleppo]: image by baraa al halabi @baraaalhalabi, 24 October 2015

the Syrian tragedy and the fall of Europe and the west

A Syrian boy is comforted amid the rubble on Thursday after an airstrike in a rebel-held neighborhood in Aleppo, Syria: photo by Thaer Mohammed/Agence France-Presse, 6 January 2016

What happens next in Aleppo will shape Europe’s future: The aftershocks of the Aleppo bombardmentwill be felt far and wide: If there were any doubts about Vladimir Putin’s objectives in Syria, the recent Russian military escalation around this city must surely have set them aside: Natalie Nougayrède, The Guardian, 6 February 2016 

If Aleppo falls, Syria’s vicious war will take a whole new turn, one with far-reaching consequences not just for the region but for Europe too. The latest government assault on the besieged northern Syrian city, which has caused tens of thousands more people to flee in recent days, is also a defining moment for relations between the west and Russia, whose airforce is playing a key role. The defeat of anti-Assad rebels who have partially controlled the city since 2012 would leave nothing on the ground in Syria but Assad’s regime and Islamic State. And all hope of a negotiated settlement involving the Syrian opposition will vanish. This has been a longstanding Russian objective -- it was at the heart of Moscow’s decision to intervene militarily four months ago.

 

‘White helmets’ rescue the wounded but their work has got far deadlier in recent weeks: photo by Anadolu Agency 6 February 2016

It is hardly a coincidence that the bombardment of Aleppo, a symbol of the 2011 anti-Assad revolution, started just as peace talks were being attempted in Geneva. Predictably, the talks soon faltered. Russian military escalation in support of the Syrian army was meant to sabotage any possibility that a genuine Syrian opposition might have its say on the future of the country. It was meant to thwart any plans the west and the UN had officially laid out. And it entirely contradicted Moscow’s stated commitment to a political process to end the war.

The aftershocks will be felt far and wide. If there is one thing Europeans have learned in 2015, it is that they cannot be shielded from the effects of conflict in the Middle East. And if there is one thing they learned from the Ukraine conflict in 2014, it is that Russia can hardly be considered Europe’s friend. It is a revisionist power capable of military aggression.

Syrians make their way to the Esselame border gate, in the Turkish province of Kilis, as they flee airstrikes in and around Aleppo: photo by Anadolu Agency, 4 February 2016

 

In fact, as the fate of Aleppo hangs in the balance, these events have -– as no other perhaps since the beginning of the war -– highlighted the connections between the Syrian tragedy and the strategic weakening of Europe and the west in general. This spillover effect is something Moscow has not only paid close attention to, but also in effect fuelled. 

The spread of instability fits perfectly with Russia’s goal of seeking dominance by exploiting the hesitations and contradictions of those it identifies as adversaries.

Aleppo will define much of what happens next. A defeat for Syrian opposition forces would further empower Isis in the myth that it is the sole defender of Sunni Muslims -– as it terrorises the population under its control. 

There are many tragic ironies here, not least that western strategy against Isis has officially depended on building up local Syrian opposition ground forces so that they might one day push the jihadi insurgency out of its stronghold in Raqqa. If the very people that were meant to be counted on to do that job as foot soldiers now end up surrounded and crushed in Aleppo, who will the west turn to? Russia  has all along claimed it was fighting Isis –- but in Aleppo it is helping to destroy those Syrian groups that have in the past proved to be efficient against Isis.

If there were ever any doubts about Russia’s objectives in Syria, events around Aleppo will surely have cleared them.

Nearly 40,000 Syrian civilians have fled Aleppo: photo by Bulent Kilic/AFP, 6 February 2016

 

Vladimir Putin has duplicated in Syria the strategy he applied to Chechnya: full military onslaught on populated areas so rebels are destroyed or forced out. There is a long history of links -– going back to the Soviet era -– between the Syrian power structure and Russian intelligence. Just as Putin’s regime physically eliminated those in Chechnya who might have been interlocutors for a negotiated peace settlement, Assad has conflated all political opposition with “terrorism”. And as there was never any settlement in Chechnya (only full-on war and destruction until the Kremlin put its own Chechen leader in place), in Putin’s view there can be no settlement in Syria with the opposition.

Russia’s strategic objectives go much further, however. Putin wants to reassert Russian power in the Middle East, but it is Europe that he really has in mind. The defining moment came in 2013, when Barack Obama gave up on airstrikes against Assad’s military bases after chemical weapons were used. This encouraged Putin to test western resolve further away, on the European continent. Putin was certainly caught off guard by the Ukrainian Maidan popular uprising, but he swiftly moved to restore dominance through use of force, including the annexation of territory. He calculated -- rightly -– that his hybrid war in Ukraine could not be prevented by the west. Russian policies in Ukraine have as a result shaken the pillars of Europe’s post-cold-war security order -– which Putin would like to see rewritten to Russia’s advantage.

Refugee children arrive in Bab-Al Salam, near Azaz, northern Syria: photo by Bulent Kilic/AFP, 6 February 2016

 

Likewise, Russian military involvement in Syria has put Nato in a bind, with one of its key members right on the frontline. Turkey’s relations with Russia have been on the brink for months. Now Moscow has openly warned Turkey against sending forces into Syria to defend Aleppo. How the Turkish leader will choose to react is another western headache.

All this is happening at a time when European governments are desperate to win Ankara’s cooperation on the refugee problem. If Turkey now turns into a troublemaker for Nato on its Middle Eastern flank, that serves Russian interests. Similarly, if Europe sees a new exodus of refugees, Russia will stand to benefit. The refugee crisis has sowed deep divisions on the continent and it has helped populist rightwing parties flourish -– many of which are Moscow’s political allies against the EU as a project. The refugee crisis has put key EU institutions under strain; it has heightened the danger of Brexit (which Moscow would welcome); and it has severely weakened Angela Merkel, the architect of European sanctions against Russia.

Syrian refugees wait for food near a refugee camp in Bab al-Salama city, northern Syria: photo by Sedat Suna/EPA, 6 February 2016

Of course, it would be an exaggeration to say that Putin had all this worked out from the start. He has been led by events as much as he has wanted to control them. Russia is not responsible for the outbreak of the civil war in Syria, nor does it have its hand in everything that happens in Ukraine. But the way Russia has cynically played its pawns should send more alarm bells ringing in the west and in the UN than is the case now.

Putin likes to cast himself as a man of order, but his policies have brought more chaos, and Europe is set to pay an increasing price. Getting the Russian regime to act otherwise will require more than wishful thinking. Aleppo is an unfolding human tragedy. But it is necessary to connect the dots between the plight of this city, Europe’s future, and how Russia hovers over both.

Residents inspect damage in the rebel-held al-Shaar neighborhood of Aleppo after airstrikes by pro-Syrian government forces: photo by Abdalrhman Ismail/Reuters, 4 February 2016

A civil defense member reacts at a site hit by what activists said were three airstrikes carried out by the Russian air force in Idlib province, Syria: photo by Khalil Ashawi/Reuters, 12 January 2016

Ten thousand Syrians waiting to enter Turkey: Davutoglu: image via Anadolu Agency (Eng) @anadoluagency, 4 February 2016

Hundreds of Syrian Turkmens enter #Turkey: image via Anadolu Agency (Eng) @anadoluagency, 6 February 2016

 

@Kilicbil ha fotografato i profughi arrivati al confine con la Turchia nelle ultime 24 ore: image via Il Post Foto @ilPostFoto, 6 February 2016

 SYRIA - Children sit on a car as Syrians fleeing Aleppo wait in Bab-Al Salam near Turkish border. By @Kilicbil #AFP: image via Frédérique Geffard @fgeffardAFP, 6 February 2016

 SYRIA - A boy lost his parents as Syrians fleeing Aleppo wait in Bab-Al Salama near Turkish border.. By @Kilicbil #AFP: image via Frédérique Geffard @fgeffardAFP, 6 February 2016

 SYRIA - A family rides a motorbike as Syrians fleeing Aleppo wait in Bab-Al Salama near Turkish border.. By @Kilicbil #AFP: image via Frédérique Geffard @fgeffardAFP, 6 February 2016

 A child cries as #Syrians fleeing #Aleppo wait near #Azaz on the #Syria #Turkey border photo @Kilicbil #AFPhoto: image via SundayTimesPictures @STPictures, 6 February 2016


 Displaced people moved toward the Turkish border Friday. The United Nations said 20,000 were stuck on the Syrian side: photo by Depo Photos via Associated Press, 6 February 2016

 

 Syrian refugees near a crossing gate on the Turkish border on Friday. Tens of thousands of civilians were fleeing the Aleppo area: photo byBulent Kilic/Agence France-Presse, 6 February 2016

 SYRIA - Refugees push each other as they wait for tents in Bab-Al Salam near the Turkish border. By @Kilic #AFP: image via AFP Photo Department @AFPphoto, 6 February 2016

Syrians mass on Turkish border as regime advances: image via AFP news agency @AFP, 5 February 2016

 

A young Syrian couple have wedding pictures taken in front of a damaged building in the war ravaged city of Homs: image via AFP news agency @AFP, 5 February 2016

 

Tens of thousands flee as #Syria regime advances near Aleppo: image via AFP news agency @AFP, 4 February 2016

SYRIA - A Syrian photographer carries injured girl following air strikes on al-Nashabiyah. By Amer Almohibany #AFP: image via Frédérique Geffard @fgffardAFP, 15 December 2015

Russian aviation bombed the city of Aleppo: image via baraa al halabi @baraaalhalabi, 28 November 2015

Not a place to despair Aleppo: image via baraa al halabi @baraaalhalabi, 30 November 2015

 

Civilians photographed in a damaged building in Syria's northern city of Aleppo following a reported air strike by government forces on Monday: photo by Karam Al-Masri/AFP, 7 December 2015

Men play chess in front of a damaged building in the rebel-controlled area of Maaret al-Naaman town in Idlib province, Syria on Monday: photo by Khalil Ashawi/Reuters, 19 October 2015

US wants to avoid 'total destruction' of Syria: Kerry: image via Agence France-Presse @AFP, 19 October 2015

 

Une photo publiée le 5 octobre 2015 par le gouvernement russe montre un bombardier Su-24M larguant une bombe sur la Syrie: image via Russian Defence Ministry/AFP, 19 October 2015

 

A class at a school in a rebel-controlled area of Damascus, Syria. The start of the new new school year was postponed several times because of airstrikes.: photo by Bassam Khabieh/Reuters, 19 October 2015

"Aleppo is more beautiful than Europe"

Graffiti from Aleppo : "Aleppo is more beautiful than Europe. Do not emigrate": image via baraa al halabi @baraaalhalabi, 18 October 2015

There's little question that Russia is determined to re-establish Assad as Syria’s leader: image via The New York Times @nytimes, 1 October 2015

[untitled]: image via Agence France-Presse @AFP, 1 October 2015

Follow our LIVE coverage as Russian jets launch a second day of air strikes in #Syria: image via Reuters Live @ReutersLive, 1 October 2015

'Curious' Russian strikes in Syria not against Islamic State: France: image via Reuters Top News @Reuters, 30 September 2015

Where are the Russian bombs in Syria falling?: image via Reuters Top News @Reuters, 1 October 2015

White House says Russian involvement in Syria risks making conflict "indefinite": image via Reuters Live @ReutersLive, 1 October 2015

America . Russia And the victim Syria: image via baraa al halabi @baraaalhalabi, 1 October 2015

 

An honor guard opens the door as Russian President Vladimir Putin prepares to enter a hall to attend a meeting with members of the Presidential Council for Civil Society and Human Rights at the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia, on Thursday: photo by An Yuri Kochetkov/Reuters, 1 October 2015

 

death path

 

[Aleppo]:: image via baraa al halabi @baraaalhalabi, 29 September 2015

A Syrian man holds his robe while walking in the partially destroyed Salaheddin neighborhood of Aleppo, under the control of the Syrian army. Syrian troops backed by artillery and warplanes fought rebels on multiple fronts on September 5 as peace envoy Lakhdar Brahimi described the death toll as "staggering" and destruction "catastrophic.": photo byJoseph Eid/AFP, 3 September 2012
 

A Syrian man carrying grocery bags tries to dodge sniper fire as he runs through an alley near a checkpoint manned by the Free Syria Army in Aleppo: photo by  Marco Longari/AFP, 14 September 2012

Smoke rises over a battle-scarred Saif Al Dawla district in Aleppo, Syria. The U.N.'s deputy secretary-general says U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon made a strong appeal to Syria's foreign minister to stop using heavy weapons against civilians and reduce the violence that is killing 100 to 200 people every day.: photo by Manu Brabo/AP, 2 October 2012 
 

 

death path: image by baraa al halabi @baraaa;halabi, 20 September 2015

Osama, a fourteen-year-old boy who lost his foot in an air strike led by Syrian government forces: image by baraa al halabi @baraaa;halabi, 20 September 2015

Une zone d'Alep sous contrôle rebelle: photo by Baraa Al-Halabi / AFP, 24 November 2014

Après un bombardement contre Alep: photo by Baraa Al-Halabi / AFP,  15 July 2014

Après un bombardement contre Alep: photo by Baraa Al-Halabi / AFP,  15 July 2014

Joseph Ceravolo: O carrion, o carrion

A cat is seen amid debris of a damaged building as the members of the civil defense team search casualties in the al Qallasa neighborhood in Aleppo: photo by Beha el Halebi / Anadolu Agency, 4 February 2016

....,,December  21, 1987

Hidden underground in a frame

...of relics and love.

Come on down, come on deep,

...The pigeon, the dove, the owl

cross over a boulder in the mud.

...O carrion, o carrion

thy gentle swollen tune

...just promise me and promise me

the world in total ruin

 

The streets were empty as ice

young and old wailing:
pleasure never goes too far.

Treasures in heaven or hell.

The cities fade, the meadows reek

...O carrion, o carrion

thy gentle swollen sight

just promise me, and promise me

the world in total light
 

Joseph Ceravolo (1934-1988): Untitled (December  21, 1987), from Collected Poems, 2012

 

Air raid by government forces on the city of Aleppo: image via baraa al halabi @baraaalhalabi, 20 September 2015

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The battle for Aleppo / animal rescue

February 8, 2016, 12:01 am

≫ Next: Jorge Luis Borges: Jactancia de quietud

≪ Previous: Fleeing Aleppo / Joseph Ceravolo: O carrion, o carrion

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 Prefabricated metal homes at the Azraq camp for Syrian refugees in northern Jordan last month. Jordanian officials estimate that there are 1.4 million Syrians in the country.: photo by Khalil Mazraawi/Agence France-Presse, 7 February 2016

After entering Aleppo, the Syrian army may set its sights on Raqqa: Robert Fisk, Dawn, 7 February 2016
 
After losing up to 60,000 soldiers in five years of fighting, the Syrian army has suddenly scored its greatest victory of the war -- smashing its way through Jabhat al-Nusra and the other rebel forces around Aleppo and effectively sealing its fate as Russia provided air strike operations outside the city.

The rebel supply lines from Turkey to Aleppo have been cut, but this does not mean the end of the story. For many months, the regime’s own military authorities -- along with tens of thousands of civilians, including many Christians -- were trapped inside Aleppo and at the mercy of shelling and mortar fire by the Nusra fighters, who surrounded them until the army opened the main highway south.

During this period, the only way to Aleppo was by plane because the army held a tiny peninsula of territory going to the airport -- I flew out one night on a military aircraft crowded with wounded Syrian troops.

But the tables have turned. It is the rebels themselves who are now surrounded, along with the tens of thousands of civilians in their sector of the city -- but they have no airport to sustain them.

On the basis of so many other battles in this appalling war, there is unlikely to be any offensive for the centre of this greatest of Syrian cities; rather it will be a slow and grinding siege to force the insurgents to surrender.

In an ironic twisting of recent history, the two Shia villages of Nubl and Zahra -- whose people had been surrounded by rebels and starved for three years, fed only by Syrian military airdrops -- have now been retaken by the Syrian military.

The Shia, co-religionists of the Alawite people from which President Bashar Al Assad comes, have been cornered in several villages in the region, although their plight has gone largely unreported.

Now the people in the rebel-held part of Aleppo are going to feel the same sense of isolation -- and, no doubt, the shellfire of their besiegers. There has always been a movement of people between the two sectors of the city -- will these passages now be closed? And what of the tens of thousands of civilians streaming north towards Turkey?

Aleppo itself was late to join the war. By some kind of historical miracle, it remained disentangled from the conflict until 2012 when rebels -- thinking they were en route to Damascus -- managed to infiltrate into the ancient city. Its streets were then burned out in months of fighting. Now it appears to be the first of Syria’s large cities to be effectively back in the hands of the regime.

What comes next? The retaking of the Roman city of Palmyra? The clearing of the lands around Deraa (of Lawrence of Arabia fame)?

And, much more dramatically, how soon will the Syrian army, its Hezbollah allies and the Russian air force set their course for the Isis “capital” of Raqqa?
The militant Islamic State (IS), which holds Palmyra, must be learning of the extraordinary developments of the past few days with deep concern. The everlasting Sunni “Islamic Caliphate” in Syria doesn’t look so everlasting any more.

Is this why the Saudis have suddenly offered to send ground troops to Syria? And why the Turks are so flustered? I doubt if anyone is weeping in Iran.

Anyway, the Saudi military is already having its feet chewed off in the disgraceful Yemen war. As for the Turks sending their own Nato soldiers across the Syrian border -- presumably at risk of being attacked by the Russians -- that is a nightmare which both Washington and Moscow must avoid.

Otherwise, we’ll find ourselves in Gavrilo Princip moment -- and we all know what happened in 1914.

(Gavrilo Princip was a Bosnian Serb who assassinated Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife in Sarajevo on June 28, 1914. After Princip and his accomplices were arrested, they implicated several members of the Serbian military, leading Austria-Hungary to issue an ultimatum to Serbia. This was used as pretext for Austria-Hungary’s invasion of Serbia, which then led to World War I.)

Thousands forced to seek refuge from Russian and regime bombing in Aleppo and Deraa: image via Akhbar @akhbar, 7 February 2016

 

With aid of Russian air strikes, Syrian regime makes advances against rebel opposition in Aleppo after four years of stymie: image via Akhbar @akhbar, 7 February 2016

A man stands in the debris of a building Friday after an airstrike carried out by the Russian military in a part of Aleppo controlled by the Syrian opposition: photo by Anadolu Agency, 6 February 2016
 

Residents inspect damage in the rebel-held al-Shaar neighborhood of Aleppo after airstrikes by pro-Syrian government forces: photo by Abdalrhman Ismail/Reuters, 4 February 2016

 

Thousands flee as Russian-backed offensive threatens to besiege #Aleppo and Deraa: image via Reuters Top News @Reuters, 5 February 2016

 

Civilians are icons of resilience in face of Assad brutality, saviors are champions in this darkness @SyriaCivilDef: image via Fadi Al-Qadi @fqadi, 7 February 2016

First pictures from #Kafr_Hamra where Russian terrorists strike again while @SyriaCivilDef evacuates dead children: image via Julian Röpcke @JulianRoepcke, 7 February 2016



First pictures from #Kafr_Hamra where Russian terrorists strike again while @SyriaCivilDef evacuates dead children: image via Julian Röpcke @JulianRoepcke, 7 February 2016

First pictures from #Kafr_Hamra where Russian terrorists strike again while @SyriaCivilDef evacuates dead children: image via Julian Röpcke @JulianRoepcke, 7 February 2016

Heroes from the @SyriaCivilDef save a #cat under the rubble from a "Russian" bombing raid on #Douma today: image via Julian Röpcke @JulianRoepcke, 6 February 2016

Heroes from the @SyriaCivilDef save a #cat under the rubble from a "Russian" bombing raid on #Douma today: image via Julian Röpcke @JulianRoepcke, 6 February 2016

Heroes from the @SyriaCivilDef save a #cat under the rubble from a "Russian" bombing raid on #Douma today: image via Julian Röpcke @JulianRoepcke, 6 February 2016

  #FSA pounding Assad army & IRGC in Nubl/Zahra north #Aleppo w/rocket launchers used for the 1st time in this battle: image via Stork @NorthernStork, 7 February 2016

 

Hind Khadir, 13, a Syrian refugee, carries wood back to her tent in an informal settlement in Mafraq, Jordan, near the Syrian border: photo by Muhammed Muheisen/Associated Press, 7 February 2016

 

Inside Bab al-Salam refugee camp (Photo by @Kilicbil): image via Kaycee Nightfire @KcNightfire, 7 February 2016

 

Syrie: des milliers de familles syriennes attendent dans le froid de passer en Turquie #AFP: image via Agence France-Presse @afpfr, 7 February 2016

 

Des milliers de familles syriennes attendent dans le froid de passer en Turquie #AFP: image via Agence France-Presse @afpfr, 7 February 2016

 

Building more refugee camps near Syria-Turkey borders north #Aleppo to accommodate the recently displaced 50k civilians: image via Stork @NorthernStork, 6 February 2016

Building more refugee camps near Syria-Turkey borders north #Aleppo to accommodate the recently displaced 50k civilians: image via Stork @NorthernStork, 6 February 2016

A Syrian man is among the thousands who have fled the fighting in and around the northern city of Aleppo. Thousands of Syrians have gathered at the Bab al-Salam crossing in an attempt to enter Turkey, which has kept the gate closed. Syrian government troops, assisted by Russian airstrikes, have been making gains in the Aleppo area.: photo by Anadolu Agency, 6 February 2016

Turkey says it won't leave Syrian refugees stranded on border to die #Aleppo: image via AFP news agency @AFP, 7 February 2016

 

La Turquie prête à ouvrir sa frontière aux Syriens fuyant Alep: image via Agence France-Presse @afpfr, 7 February 2016

it's really hard to work the day after a baby sea lion went to a restaurant: image via Julia Carrie Wong @juliacarriew, 5 February 2016

 SPAIN - 2 disguised people walk in a cemetery during ancient carnival 'Entroido' of Laza. By @PedroArmestre #AFP: image via Frédérique Geffard @fgeffardAFP, 7 February 2016

*Nationwide commercial voice* "I just won the Super Bowl.": image via Carl Steward @stewardsfolly, 7 February 2016

 

animal rescue

It went on so long yet was over before

dust to dust

from dawn till dusk with whitepowder people walking

into the next world shocked monkey exploded eyesockets

deep in the night

the human growth hormone took hold

 

US - Fireworks burst over the New York skyline in honor of the Chinese Lunar New Year. By Kena Betancur: image via AFP Photo Department @AFPphoto, 7 February 2016

 

Hind Khadir, 13, a Syrian refugee, carries wood back to her tent in an informal settlement in Mafraq, Jordan, near the Syrian border: photo by Muhammed Muheisen/Associated Press, 7 February 2016

 

 

 Prefabricated metal homes at the Azraq camp for Syrian refugees in northern Jordan last month. Jordanian officials estimate that there are 1.4 million Syrians in the country.: photo by Khalil Mazraawi/Agence France-Presse, 7 February 2016

Jorge Luis Borges: Jactancia de quietud

February 10, 2016, 1:21 am

≫ Next: Wallace Stevens: The Plain Sense of Things

≪ Previous: The battle for Aleppo / animal rescue

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Refugees in a rubber boat off Lesvos: image via MSF Sea @MSF_Sea, 8 February 2016
 

 
Escrituras de luz embisten la sombra, más prodigiosas que meteoros.
La alta ciudad inconocible arrecia sobre el campo.
Seguro de mi vida y de mi muerte, miro los ambiciosos
y quisiera entenderlos.
Su día es ávido como el lazo en el aire.
Su noche es tregua de la ira en el hierro, pronto en acometer.
Hablan de humanidad.
Mi humanidad está en sentir que somos voces de una misma penuria.
Hablan de patria.
Mi patria es un latido de guitarra, unos retratos y una vieja espada,
la oración evidente del sauzal en los atardeceres.
El tiempo está viviéndome.
Más silencioso que mi sombra, cruzo el tropel de su levantada codicia.
Ellos son imprescindibles, únicos, merecedores del mañana.
Mi nombre es alguien y cualquiera.
Paso con lentitud, como quien viene de tan lejos que no espera llegar.

Jorge Luis Borges (1899-1996): Jactancia de quietud, from Luna de enfrente, 1925

 Syrian children Musa Dik, 5, in the rear bed, and Raghad Dik, 9, in a hospital in the border town of Kilis, Turkey, after they were injured in a Russian airstrike: photo by Bryan Denton for The New York Times, 8 February 2016

 

Rajaa Dik, a Syrian, right, sat with her children Musa, 5, in the rear bed, and Raghad, 9, in a hospital in the border town of Kilis, Turkey, after they were injured in a Russian airstrike: photo by Bryan Denton for The New York Times, 8 February 2016

Serious traffic jam on the back roads of beautiful #Lesvos this morning.: image via MSF Sea @MSF_Sea, 8 February 2016

Jorge Luis Borges: Boast of Quietness   

Writings of light assault the darkness, more prodigious than meteors.
The tall unknowable city takes over the countryside.
Sure of my life and death, I observe the ambitious and would like to understand them.
Their day is greedy as a lariat in the air.
Their night is a rest from the rage within steel, quick to attack.
They speak of humanity.
My humanity is in feeling we are all voices of that same poverty.
They speak of homeland.
My homeland is the rhythm of a guitar, a few portraits, an old sword,
the willow grove's visible prayer as evening falls.
Time is living me.
More silent than my shadow, I pass through the loftily covetous multitude.
They are indispensable, singular, worthy of tomorrow.
My name is someone and anyone.
I walk slowly, like one who comes from so far away he doesn't expect to arrive.

(English version by Stephen Kessler, 1999)

Refugee crisis: 35 die off Turkish coast: image via dromografosNews @dromografosNews, 8 February 2016

Siege of Aleppo takes West even further from achieving its key goals in Syria: image via AFP news agency @AFP, 9 February 2016

Syrians living in a makeshift camp inside a farm near the Oncupinar crossing gate in Kilis. By @Kilicbil #AFP: image via AFP Photo Department @AFPphoto, 9 February 2016

#migrantcrisis A woman waits to return to #Syria at the Oncupinar crossing gate, #Kilis, #Turkey #AFP by @Kilicbil: image via Aurelia BAILLY @AureliaBAILLY, 8 February 2016

Sorry kids, @realDonaldTrumpsays no, after all you might be terrorists (photo by @kilicbil): image via Kaycee Nightfire Aurelia BAILLY @KcNightfire, 8 February 2016

 Syrian families line-up waiting to go back to Syria near Kilis. By @Kilicbil #AFP: image via AFP Photo Department @AFPphoto, 8 February 2016

 #UPDATE Turkey sends in aid for stranded Syrian refugees: image via AFP news agency @AFP, 8 February 2016

 
 Syrians fleeing Aleppo arrived at the Turkish border-crossing gate in northern Syria on Saturday. A United Nations report found that the Syrian government had mounted a “systematic and widespread attack” on civilians.: photo by Bulent Kilic/Agence France-Presse, 8 February 2016

 Syrians trying to cross into Turkey.: photo by Bunyamin Aygun/Associated Press, 8 February 2016

This futuristic fighter jet was just unveiled to America during the #SuperBowl #SB50: image via Dan Lamothe @Dan Lamothe, 7 February 2016

 Newton was harassed by Broncos defenders all night: photo by Chang W. Lee /  The New York Times, 8 February 2016


Carolina Panthers quarterback Cam Newton was sacked six times and fumbled twice against the Denver Broncos on Sunday: photo by A J Mast for The New York Times, 8 February 2016


Newton did not have much to say during his post-game news conference: photo by Kevin C. Cox / The New York Times, 8 February 2016


Beyoncé and Chris Martin of Coldplay during the Super Bowl halftime show on Sunday: photo by Chang W. Lee / The New York Times, 8 February 2016

Beyonce takes US by storm with new activist role: image via AFP news agency @AFP, 9 February 2016

Republican presidential candidate Sen. Marco Rubio sips coffee before doing a television interview at Norton’s Classic Cafe during a campaign stop in Nashua, New Hampshire: photo by Chip Somodevilla via FT Photo Diary, 8 February 2016

Nepalese Hindu women cover themselves with a plastic sheet, and take shelter from the rain, during the Swasthani Bratakatha festival in Kathmandu: photo by Nepal: photo by Niranjan Shrestha/AP Photo, 8 February 2016

A wounded boy at a hospital after he was injured in ongoing conflict, in Sana’a, Yemen: photo by Yahya Arhab/EPA, 8 February 2016  

Waves break against the Boulogne-sur-mer harbour pier, France: photo by Philippe Huguen/AFP, 8 February 2016

#WAVES break against a pier in Les Sables-d'Olonne. #AFP Photo by @LoicVenance: image via Aurelia BAILLY @AureliaBAILLY, 9 February 2016

Rioters throw bricks at police in the Mong Kok district of Hong Kong. Hong Kong’s Lunar New Year celebration descended into chaotic scenes as protesters and police clashed over a street market selling fish balls and other local holiday delicacies: photo by Vincent Yu/Ap, 8 February 2016

Thousands of Indian Hindu devotees gather to perform rituals at the Sangam, the confluence of rivers Ganges, Yamuna, and the mythical Saraswati on Mauni Amavasya or new moon day, the third and the most auspicious date of bathing during the annual month long Hindu religious festival Magh Mela in Allahabad, India: photo by Kumar Singh/AP, 8 February 2016

Russian cosmonaut Sergei Volkov performs a spacewalk outside the International Space Station: photo by Roscosmos/Reuters, 8 February 2016

Estacio de Sa samba school’s Drum Queen Luana Bandeira performs during the carnival parade at the Sambadrome in Rio de Janeiro: photo by Sergio Moraes/Reuters, 8 February 2016

Carnival revellers dressed as “Peliqueiros” run along a street in Spain’s northwestern village of Laza. “Peliqueiros”, or ancient tax collectors, pursued villagers through the streets ringing their cowbells and hitting villagers with their sticks: photo by Miguel Vidal/Reuters, 8 February 2016

An Indian man searches for coins offered by Hindu devotees at Sangam during the annual Magh Mela festival in Allahabad: photo by Sanjay Kanojia/AFP, 5 February 2016

 MEXICO - A municipality worker fumigates a home to prevent the spread of Zika in Acapulco: image via AFP Photo Department @AFPphoto, 9 February 2016
  

Protected by a mosquito net, Nadia Gonzalez recovers from a bout of dengue fever at a hospital in Luque, Paraguay. Dengue, like the Zika virus, is transmitted by the same vector, the Aedes aegypti mosquito: photo by Justin Sullivan via FT Photo Diary, 5 February 2016

A girl paints a mural that educates people about a mosquito control project in the village of San Diego village, in La Libertad, Salvador. People in San Diego are fighting the Aedes aegypti mosquito, vector of the Zika virus: photo by Marvin Recinos/AFP, 5 February 2016

A cat shelter on the outskirts of Yangon. The shelter houses over 200 animals which are rescued from Yangon streets. The shelter provides food and basic medical treatments.: photo by Ye Aung Thu/AFP, 5 February 2016

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton walks on stage during a break as she debates with U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) during their MSNBC Democratic Candidates Debate at the University of New Hampshire in Durham, New Hampshire. This is the final debate for the Democratic candidates before the New Hampshire primaries: photo by Justin Sullivan via FT Photo Diary, 8 February 2016

Woman who accused Bill Clinton of assault to campaign against Hillary: image via Reuters Top News @Reuters, 9 February 2016

Senator Bernie Sanders at the Palace Theater in Manchester, N.H., on Monday: photo by Todd Heisler/The New York Times, 9 February 2016

 
 
Senator Bernie Sanders held a campaign rally at Franklin Pierce University in Rindge, N.H., on Saturday. As the United States is battling the Islamic State, and coping with an aggressive Russia and an economically weakening China, Mr. Sanders has steadfastly refused to say much about America’s place in the world.: photo by Todd Heisler/The New York Times , 8 February 2016

A street food vendor walks in front of a colorful graffiti in Bangkok, Thailand. Thailand’s economy is forecast to grow at 3.7 percent in 2016 revised down from earlier projected of 3.8 percent driven by the private consumption and investment as well as government stimulus measures and billion-dollar investment in infrastructure project, according to the Fiscal Policy Office: photo by Diego Azubel/EPA, 3 February 2016

Gendarmes walk through makeshift shacks during the evacuation of a Roma migrants’ camp deemed insecure and unsanitary, on former railway tracks along Boulevard Ney in northern Paris: photo by Dominique Faget/AFP, 3 January 2016



Thousands of Indian Hindu devotees gather to perform rituals at the Sangam, the confluence of rivers Ganges, Yamuna, and the mythical Saraswati on Mauni Amavasya or new moon day, the third and the most auspicious date of bathing during the annual month long Hindu religious festival Magh Mela in Allahabad, India: photo by Kumar Singh/AP, 8 February 2016

Siria: esodo da Aleppo. Ue richiama Turchia sui confini: "Accogliere rifugiati è dovere": image via la Repubblica @repubblicait, 6 February 2016 

Turkey prepares for huge refugee wave as Syrians flee govt attack #AFP: image via Agence France-Presse @AFP, 6 February 2016

FBI confirms Hillary Clinton email investigation: image via Yahoo News @YahooNews 9 February 2016


Donald Trump in New Hampshire on Monday: photo by Damon Winter/The New York Times, 8 February 2016

At thriving gun clubs across New Hampshire, good people strive to be as lethal as bad ones: image via NYT Opinion @nytopinion, 9 February 2016

View of a figure of the Santa Muerte (Holy Death) at a sanctuary in Santa Maria Cuautepec, Tultitlan, Mexico: image via Yuri Cortez @YuriYurisky, 9 February 2016

Share traders dressed in carnival costumes work a their desks in front of the DAX index at the stock exchange on Shrove Tuesday in Frankfurt, Germany.  Frankfurt’s bourse traders follow a long tradition by wearing carnival costumes on Shrove Tuesday: photo by Kai Pfaffenbach/Reuters, 9 February 2016

Donald J. Trump held a town hall event at the Derry-Salem Elks Lodge in Salem: image via the New York Times @nyt, 9 February 2016

Hillary Clinton spoke with patrons at the Chez-Vachon restaurant in Manchester, N.H., on Monday: photo by Richard Perryr/The New York Times, 9 February 2016  

Syrian Air Force destroys large rebel convoy heading to northern #Aleppo #Syria: image via Al-Masdar News @TheArabSource, 9 February 2016

#FSA Jaysh al-Mujahdeen send reinforcements to #Aleppo: image via Stork @NorthernStork, 9 February 2016

In #Aleppo, underground schools face bombardments and burnout: image via Al Arabiya English @AlArabiya_Eng, 7 February 2016

the plain sense of things 

............"we had come to an end of the imagination"
 
and all the major
and minor

structures fallen down

. breathe

every few seconds

then wait

then breathe again

all through the night

but no -- I'm not on

or under

fire in

or fleeing

Aleppo

or floating on a drifting rubber boat

on the dark cold sea

off Lesvos

 
Pedestrians are reflected in a stock market indicator board in Tokyo. Japan's market plummeted following sharp declines in US stocks and after crude oil prices tumbled below 30 dollars per barrel: photo by Franck Robichon/EPA, 3 February 2016

 
Global stocks hit the rocks after Asian markets slump: image via Reuters Top News @Reuters, 9 February 2016

Costumed revellers in protective helmets throw oranges during Carnival in the northern Italian Piedmont town of Ivrea, Italy: photo by Luca Bruno/AP Photo 9 February 2016



Crowds gather as a sperm whale lies dead after becoming stranded on a beach between Old Hunstanton and Holme in Hunstanton, England. The whale is the 29th to have died after beaching in Europe in the past two weeks: photo by Ben Pruchnie via FT Photo Diary, 5 February 2016

TURKEY - A Syrian woman holds a baby as she waits with others to return to Syria near Kilis. By @Kilicbil: image via Frédérique Geffard @fgeffardafp, 8 February 2016

Wallace Stevens: The Plain Sense of Things

February 11, 2016, 12:30 am

≫ Next: Malheur: Refuge / an end to the shofars

≪ Previous: Jorge Luis Borges: Jactancia de quietud

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A migrant, identified as 20-year old Pelen Hussein from Syria, stands on top of a capsized boat as he waits to be rescued by members of Turkish Coast Guard Air Command in the Aegean Sea off the waters of Edremit bay, Turkey: photo by Reuters, 10 February 2016

After the leaves have fallen, we return
To a plain sense of things.  It is as if
We had come to an end of the imagination,
Inanimate in an inert savoir.

It is difficult even to choose the adjective
For this blank cold, this sadness without cause.
The great structure has become a minor house.
No turban walks across the lessened floors.

The greenhouse never so badly needed paint.
The chimney is fifty years old and slants to one side.
A fantastic effort has failed, a repetition
In a repetitiousness of men and flies.

Yet the absence of the imagination had
Itself to be imagined.  The great pond,
The plain sense of it, without reflections, leaves,
Mud, water like dirty glass, expressing silence

Of a sort, silence of a rat come out to see,
The great pond and its waste of the lilies, all this
Had to be imagined as an inevitable knowledge,
Required, as a necessity requires.

Wallace Stevens (1879-1955): The Plain Sense of Things, autumn 1952, first published in The Nation, 6 December 1952; included in The Rock, 1954

A girl poses for pictures under decorated trees as the Chinese Lunar New Year which welcomes the Year of the Monkey is celebrated at Daguanyuan park in Beijing: photo by Damir Sagolj/Reuters, 10 February 2016



Believers pray around a cross-shaped platform covered with candles placed in jars of honey during a ceremony marking the day of Saint Haralampi, Orthodox patron saint of bee-keepers, at the Church of the Blessed Virgin in Blagoevgrad, eastern Bulgaria: photo by Nikolay Doychinov/AFP, 10 February 2016

Devotion to Santa Muerte (Saint Death) growing fast in Mexico despite Vatican condemnation: image via AFP news agency @AFP, 10 February 2016

Indian bystanders watch a wild elephant walk on a street in Siliguri. The animal was later tranquilised and captured.: image via AFP news agency @AFP, 10 February 2016

Donald J. Trump recorded a lopsided victory in the Republican presidential primary in New Hampshire on Tuesday: photo by Damon Winter/The New York Times, 10 February 2016

Johnny Depp as the politician in the fake Trump biopic. ‘It was a crazy, completely nuts idea that somehow we pulled off,’ said Funny or Die co-founder Adam McKay: photo by Funny or Die via The Guardian, 10 December 2016 
 

Johnny Depp as Donald Trump: photo via Funny or Die/The New York Times, 10 February 2016  


 
Johnny Depp as Donald Trump, with Michaela Watkins as Ivana Trump: photo via Funny or Die/The New York Times, 10 February 2016

We unearthed this lost 80's Donald Trump TV movie. You're welcome: image via Funny or Die @funnyordie, 10 February 2016

Johnny Depp stars in @funnyordie fake Donald Trump biopic: image via AFP Entertainment @AFPceleb, 10 February 2016

Meanwhile, back at the Refuge...

@thomas boyd photo from outside Malheur National Wildlife Refuge tonight. Lights are seen from the Narrows roadblock.: image via Maxine Bernstein @maxoregonian, 10 February 2016

We're at the Narrows just outside of road block. Quiet here.: image via Wanda Moore @WandaKTVZ, 10 February 2016

 

 

 

Nevada assemblywoman Michele Fiore, who has interposed herself as an intermediary supporting the armed occupiers in the Oregon Standoff, is seen with Ammon Bundy, the son of Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy, in her office on 24 March 2015: photo by Kyle Roerink via Las Vegas Sun, 10 February 2016  

 

Who is Michele Fiore?: Julia Carrie Wong, The Guardian, 10 February 2016

Michele Fioreis a Republican Nevada state assemblywoman. Now in her second term, the Brooklyn native is perhaps best known for her adamant support of gun rights and Cliven Bundy’s 2014 standoff with the federal government.

On Monday, Fiore announced that she would travel to Oregon to support Ammon Bundy and the other Malheur occupiers currently under indictment. Fiore had planned to hold a press conference at the law offices of Arnold law firm on Thursday morning where a statement from Ammon Bundy would be read.

In 2014, Fiore spent time at Cliven Bundy’s Nevada ranch during the family’s standoff with the Bureau of Land Management. Fiore called the militia members who participated in the armed standoff “freedom fighters” and called on members of law enforcement agencies “not to obey your superiors when given a direct order to attack your fellow Americans fighting for the freedoms granted to us by our constitution”.

Fiore drew national attention again last December for her Christmas card, which featured her entire family, including a small child, holding firearms. “It’s up to Americans to protect America. We’re just your ordinary American family,” Fiore wrote in a Facebook post sharing the image.

This is Michele #Fiore's version of Peace On Earth #Oregonstandoff #Malheur #Burns #Surrender: image via Jeanne K. @SnarkAmendment, 10 February 2016

 Le #FBI confirme le début de l’opération pour mettre fin à l’occupation d’un refuge de l’#Oregon par une milice: image via Breaking3zero @Breaking3zero, 10 February 2016

We're now patching in Peggy Blomquist from Fargo on the #oregonstandoff live stream. Go ahead Peggy!: image via Hal Espen @HalSF, 10 February 2016

 

Le refuge est occupé depuis 40 jours. 4 miliciens sont encerclés par le #FBI. Nous #LT opération en cours.: image via Breaking3zero @Breaking3zero, 10 February 2016

Depuis l’aéroport de #Portland, Michele #Fiore, élue du #Nevada, tente de raisonner les miliciens. Intense.: image via Breaking3zero @Breaking3zero, 10 February 2016

"The world is watching" rightwing Brooklyn native-turned-Nevada assemblywoman and notorious gun nut Michele Fiore says as she leads hysterical #OregonStandoff armed remnant group in livestreamed prayer for compassionate rescue by patriotic divinely-guided unicorns: image via KOIN News @KOINNews, 10 February 2016

Le #Oregonstandoff est le 1er sujet sur #Twitter USA. Pendant ce temps, CNN parle de #Beyonce, #Fox de #Trump: image via Breaking3zero @Breaking3zero, 10 February 2016

Pendant 40 jours, Michele #Fiore a encouragé les miliciens. Aujourd’hui, elle tente de les raisonner #Oregon: image via Breaking3zero @Breaking3zero, 10 February 2016

Just go do a Google Image search for Michelle Fiore y'all. #Oregonstandoff: image by Craig Newman @craignewman, 10 February 2016

Michelle Fiore has a 2nd Amendment calendar.  #Oregonstandoff: image by Craig Newman @craignewman, 10 February 2016

Pedro just joined the call. No one knows who Pedro is. #Oregonstandoff: tweet by Molly Young @mollykyoung, 10 February 2016

Pedro will save you #Oregonstandoff: image by Craig Newman @craignewman, 10 February 2016

@VoteFiore talks tough but respectfully question her or criticize her policies? : image via The Blue Nevadan @TheBlueNevadan, 10 February 2016

The good news is that this is the guy [rightwing talkshow host Gavin Seim] who's the peacemaker right now during the #Oregonstandoff: image via Daniel Walters @danielwinlander, 10 February 2016

 

 

 The Bundy email list sent out a shrill demand: image via jj macnab @jjmacnab, 10 February 2016

@jjmacnab @msbellows "What's this country coming to? A Patriot can't even attempt to overthrow it in peace anymore.": image via Gargoyle @Patztense, 10 February 2016

 

@jjmacnab @msbellows Steven Brooks is with Jason Blomgren and Nick Fisher (possibly in Burns): image via Gargoyle @Patztense, 10 February 2016

 

Cliven Bundy: photo via Willamette Week, 10 February 2016

 

Cliven Bundy Is In Multnomah County Jail: The FBI detained Bundy and took him to the jail on a U.S. Marshal's hold: Aaron Mesh, Willamette Week, 10 February 2016

Cliven Bundy, the Nevada rancher whose sons seized an Eastern Oregon wildlife refuge last month, is being held in Multnomah County Jail after arriving at the Portland International Airport tonight.

The FBI detained Bundy and took him to the jail on a U.S. Marshal's hold, according to the Multnomah County Jail's booking website.

Charges have not yet been announced. The Oregonian's Les Zaitz reports on Twitter that Bundy was arrested "on federal charges for the 2014 standoff in Nevada with federal agents."

Lights are seen from the Narrows roadblock near Burns, Oregon, as FBI agents surrounded the remaining four occupiers at the Malheur national wildlife refuge: photo by Thomas Boyd/AP, 10 February 2016

 

President Barack Obama returns a salute as he boards Air Force One before his departure from Andrews Air Force Base: photo by Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP, 10 February 2016

Malheur: Refuge / an end to the shofars

February 11, 2016, 8:38 pm

≫ Next: Giuseppe Ungaretti: Lontano / Reflections in a Puddle

≪ Previous: Wallace Stevens: The Plain Sense of Things

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No sign of lawyers, lawmakers or clergy expected to take part in #OregonStandoff surrender: image via Kyle Iboshi @Kyle Iboshi, 11 February 2016

Outside courthouse, Wilson Freimuth plans to use his shofar all day "You ever heard of psychological warfare?": image via Leah Sottile @Leah_Sottile, 11 February 2016

Michael Arnold, attny 4 Ammon Bundy, fixes up @washingtonpost reporter's car. Deer did the damage.: image via Leah Sottile @Leah_Sottile, 11 February 2016

Brent from Louisiana answered the call from Fry. He has a bullhorn instead of a weapon.: image via Amanda Peacher @amandapeacher, 11 February 2016

These two young guys from Burns also answered Fry's call. "I don't want to see these guys die," said one.: image via Amanda Peacher @amandapeacher, 11 February 2016  Oregon, USA

Five people walked up and are speaking with law enforcement. Officer says "we appreciate that.". #OregonStandoff: image via Conrad Wilson @conradjwilson, 11 February 2016  Oregon, USA

Convoy is approaching #OregonStandoff: image via Conrad Wilson @conradjwilson, 11 February 2016

 

Big FBI convoy leaving the refuge just moments ago. All 4 remaining occupiers turned themselves in #OregonStandoff: image via Conrad Wilson @conradjwilson, 11 February 2016

 

Here's an image you're going to see a lot of all day #OregonStandoff: image via Conrad Wilson @conradjwilson, 11 February 2016

 

Real quiet (and dark) here at the FBI checkpoint near the Malheur Refuge HQ #OregonStandoff: image via Conrad Wilson @conradjwilson, 11 February 2016

 
A roadblock near Burns, Ore., as F.B.I. agents surrounded the remaining four occupiers at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge on Wednesday: photo by Thomas Boyd/The Oregonian via Associated Press, 11 February 2015


Thomas Wagner waved a flag near the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge on Thursday: photo by Rebecca Boone/Associated Press, 111 February 2016

No tarp on earth is strong enough to cover over the stink of murican patriot trash left behind at the bird refuge by the pinhead peckerwood revolution livestream camo divas

What a pig sty they have left us to clean up! #OregonStandoff: image via Cornelia @PaladinCornelia, 11 February 2016



Cliven Bundy was arrested on Wednesday night: photo by Multnomah County Sheriff's Office, 11 February 2016



Blaine [Cooper] looks a little too excited to be in custody: image via Kim Freda @ksfreda 11 February 2016

If the guys with the shofars call in...

Why are these Oregon standoff dudes blowing #shofars?: image via Gabe Friedman @GabeFriedman563, 21 January 2016

 

 

Oregon militia leaders blow 'battle trumpet' shofars: photo via Facebook / Jewish Telegraphic Agency, 19 January 2016

In between songs, the mighty shofars rang out. The Sharp kids looked horrified at the grown men who produced such a god-awful cacophony: tweet by jj macnab @jjmacnab, 4:03 PM - 23 Jan 2016

If the guys with the shofars call in...

Where the heck is David Fry?

Victoria wants to call in and sing. Nooooooooo.

Gavin thinks that telephone campaign got militants out of solitary confinement. They don't know how prison quarantine works.

Sandy thinks that God sent them to be there because they have steaks and pork to eat.

Sandy and Sean: "We need a miracle." Praying again. Seim: "We ask that you send legions of angels here tonight."

FBI is moving vehicles behind the militants.

The Bundy email list sent out a shrill demand.

During the Ed and Elaine Brown standoff (9 months), this type of manic call took place every single day for an hour. For 9 months....

FBI need to arrest Cliven Bundy.

Troll named Pedro was patched into the call so Gavin disconnected the militants.

The final four are negotiating among themselves and Fiore asks them if they want her to pick them up some food from McDonalds. Sigh.

Fiore: Did you guys eat some dinner. Sean: No, we had some snacks though.

Where is Cliven Bundy?

FBI Tells Fiore that they will not escalate the situation tonight.

Common core discussion. Almost 10,000 listeners drop off.

Sean is ranting about weapon/ammo conspiracy theories that were passed around the internet a year ago.

Sean: "We have to go to the bathroom outside. We're making a lot of sacrifices."

And the final four are back on the line but didn't get Victoria back on the call. Yay!

If Victoria sings, "This land is your land" again, I'm out.

In an effort to patch in Victoria, Gavin cut off the final four at the refuge.

They keep threatening listeners that Victoria Sharp will be singing on the live feed. Please, no.

If the guys with the shofars call in...

-- tweets via @jjmacnab, 11 February 2016

Last occupiers in #OregonStandoff booked into jail; due in court tomorrow. #KOIN6Nrews: image via Brent Wesiberg, 11 February 2016

We the People Chapter 6, Section 6772-b: or, The Zombie Nightmare of the Living Dead and Not Going Away Aspect of Eternal Recurrence Wrapped Inside the Enigma Which Is the Go Ahead Cut the Head Off My Snake It's Too Damn Dumb to Die Pinhead Peckerwood Revolution

 

 

Harney County common law grand jury taps Sheriff Glenn Palmer as their leader: image via JJ  MacNab @jjmacnab, 11 February 2016

 

@jjmacnab @msbellows The Oregon Common Law Grand Jury edict: image via Gargoyle @Patztense, 11 February 2016 

 

You may know the shofar as a musical instrument of Jewish antiquity, traditionally blown in synagogues during Rosh Hashanah—but did you know that right now, in the frozen hinterland of the Pacific Northwest, the Oregon militiamen are blowing the HORNS OF FREEDOM as we speak? The following video was shared by militia honcho Blaine Cooper with this caption: SHARE UPDATE BURNS OREGON! CHRISTIANS THE BATTLE TRUMPET HAS BEEN SOUNDED TIME TO RISE! CALL TO ACTION SEND IN THE TROOPS TO STAND WITH US IN BURNS OREGON!: photo via Facebook/Gawker, 19 January 2016

Refuge

 

 #OregonStandoff ends in time to prepare for seasonal visitors: birds [like this family of common merganser ducks]: image via David Yarnold @david_yarnold, 11 February 2016

 #Oregonstandoff Today's real winners: image via Baseball @baseballminutia, 11 February 2016

 

 #Oregonstandoff: How you can volunteer to help restore Malheur wildlife refuge [photo: a probable Western and Clark's Grebe hubrid has distinctively different chicks / Kay Steele, May 2015]: image via The Oregonian @Oregonian, 11 February 2016

Refugee
 

My mommy’s nest in the watchtower was disturbed. Is it safe to come back now Lady Police Officer? #OregonStandoff: image via Cornelia @PaladinCornelia, 11 February 2016

 

Brutal merciless incurable I can feel
your diseased
solace slipping through my arteries
Your yen two wol slee me sodenly
I may the beautee of hem not sustene
So woundeth hit throughout my herte kene
sd the large human with many guns tenderly
to the little owl on the murican roadside
outside the trashed sanctuary

Lookout tower at #Malheur occupied by stern new observers armed with talons, beaks [photo: Great Horned Owls at Malheur National Wildlife Refuge headquarters fire lookout station / Terry and Kay Steele, May 2015] #OregonStandoff: image via Deborah Hartman @frankiecatPDX, 11 February 2016

As #OregonStandoff Ends at Wildlife Refuge, Let’s Get Back To Work—Together: image via Nature Conservancy @nature_org, 11 February 2016

Giuseppe Ungaretti: Lontano / Reflections in a Puddle

February 12, 2016, 9:32 pm

≫ Next: Rowing Towards the Holy Well of the Insane on St Valentine's Day

≪ Previous: Malheur: Refuge / an end to the shofars

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A Syrian civil defense worker led an injured man to safety after airstrikes in the rebel-held Eastern Ghouta area on the outskirts of Damascus, Syria: photo by Amer Almohibany/Agence France-Presse, 12 February 2016

lontano lontano

come un cieco

m'hanno portato per mano

..................Versa il 15 febbraio 1917

An Afghan woman begged in Kabul, Afghanistan, a the country that still relies on foreign aid for most of its national income.: photo by Hedayatullah Amid/European Pressphoto Agency, 10 February 2016

as from a distance 
as from a distance

like one blinded

they led me by the hand

..........Versa, 15 February 1917

GIuseppe Ungaretti (1888-1970): Lontano (15 February 1917), from Allegria di naufragi, 1919; English approximation TC

Chinese burned incense to worship the God of Fortune at Guiyuan Temple on the fifth day of Lunar New Year in Wuhan, China: photo by China Stringer Network/Reuters, 12 February 2016

A Greek farmer clashed with the police over proposed pension changes outside the Agriculture Ministry in Athens: photo by Alkis Konstantinidis/Reuters, 12 February 2016

Syrian emergency workers carried a body after the airstrikes in the rebel-held Eastern Ghouta area on the outskirts of Damascus: photo by Abdulmonam Eassa/Agence France-Presse, 12 February 2016



Syrian emergency workers carried a body after the airstrikes in the rebel-held Eastern Ghouta area on the outskirts of Damascus: photo by Abdulmonam Eassa/Agence France-Presse, 12 February 2016

Poultry arrived in Syria on a truck from Turkey near Kilis, a border crossing in southeastern Turkey: photo by Osman Orsal/Reuters, 12 February 2016

Pakistani mourners gathered around the bodies of people killed when a tanker carrying gas collided with a car in Pakistan’s Punjab province: photo by Arif Ali/Agence France-Presse, 10 February 2016

Yemenis inspected a building that destroyed in what appeared to be a Saudi airstrike in Sana, Yemen. A family of five was killed.: photo by European Pressphoto Agency, 10 February 2016

Syrians waited to cross into Syria at the Oncupinar border crossing in the southeastern city of Kilis, Turkey, on Thursday: photo by Osman Orsal/Reuters, 12 February 2016

The Oncupinar crossing gate. Syrians who went to Turkey to earn money have been unable to get back into Syria to bring their families to safety.: photo by Bulent Kilic/Agence France-Presse, 12 February 2016

The body of a Syrian teenager killed in a mortar attack in Douma, Syria, was brought to a mosque before the funeral: photo by Abd Doumany/Agence France-Presse, 11 February 2016

Migrants and refugees build a church in the “jungle” of Calais: photo by Sergei Gapon/AFP, 11 February 2016

A rally was held protesting North Korea in Seoul, the capital of South Korea, in part to condemn the North for a recent nuclear test and rocket launching: photo by Chung Sung-Jun via New York Times, 11 February 2016

A family waved a flag on Thursday in support of the last of the occupiers at Malheur Wildlife Refuge near Burns, Oregon: photo by Rob Kerr/Agence France-Press, 11 February 2016

 A puddle in a road in Minsk, during warm winter weather: photo by Sergei Gapon/AFP, 1 February 2016

A woman is reflected in a puddle as she crosses a road in Minsk, during warm winter weather: photo by Sergei Gapon/AFP, 1 February 2016

Migrants and refugees build a church in the “jungle” of Calais: photo by Sergei Gapon/AFP, 11 February 2016

A rally was held protesting North Korea in Seoul, the capital of South Korea, in part to condemn the North for a recent nuclear test and rocket launching: photo by Chung Sung-Jun via New York Times, 11 February 2016

like a blind man

they led me

A Syrian civil defense worker led an injured man to safety after airstrikes in the rebel-held Eastern Ghouta area on the outskirts of Damascus, Syria: photo by Amer Almohibany/Agence France-Presse, 12 February 2016

The body of a Syrian teenager killed in a mortar attack in Douma, Syria, was brought to a mosque before the funeral: photo by Abd Doumany/Agence France-Presse, 11 February 2016

Rowing Towards the Holy Well of the Insane on St Valentine's Day

February 13, 2016, 8:16 pm

≫ Next: a soul of winter

≪ Previous: Giuseppe Ungaretti: Lontano / Reflections in a Puddle

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Michael's Lane, Dublin City. St Michael's lane close to Christ Church was a particularly poverty-stricken area, with three or four families to each house in the lane. The main profession (as seemingly evidenced by what we see hanging around -- other than the kids!) was that of "clothes fixer".: photo by Robert French, c. late 19th/early 20th c. (Lawrence Photograph Collection, National Library of Ireland)

MIDSUMMER SESSIONS -- Green-Street

The Recorder, with Aldermen Sir G. Whiteford and Morrison sat yesterday.

Michael Purcell, Samuel Walsh, Anne Walsh and Margaret Flanagan were indicted for assaulting John Bolton and stealing from his person several bank notes and sovereigns amounting in all to 54/.

John Bolton examined -- I am a pig-jobber. I met the prisoner Purcell in Michaels-lane, early on the 20th of June, in a house in which I was robbed of twelve shillings; I then put myself under his protection, and asked him where I could get a respectable lodging for the night; he induced me to go to Walsh's public-house in Exchequer-street, where I got a noggin of whiskey; on our way there I showed him all the money I had, and said I was very fortunate not to have lost it all where I lost the twelve shillings; I had 25l in notes and 29 sovereigns; it was in a back-room I got the whiskey, and Purcell and Anne Flanagan followed me there; Flanagan made several overtures of friendship to me, but I told her I would have nothing at all to do with her; I then gave Mrs. Walsh a half sovereign for whiskey, and she returned a bad one for it, which I swear, most positively was not the one I gave her (witness here produced the half sovereign). I got all my sovereigns weighed before I left England; but for the curiosity of the thing, I put it in my mouth and gave her a note. She kept the change so long as made me get into a passion, and say, that I would go away and come back again for it. When I was going off, Purcell caught hold of me, and knocked me down, and then I lost my money; Flanagan was present at the time, but I can't say she laid her hands in me; Mrs. Walsh saw the whole transaction, and Walsh himself was at the door, and let the others out so quietly as induced me to believe that he was concerned with them in robbing me; Purcell went out first and Flanagan stopped behind him for a few minutes.

A watchman proved that the pig-jobber called on him in Exchequer-street, and said he was robbed in Walsh's house; that Walsh followed him and charged Anne Flanagan, whom she took to Clarendon-street watch-house; that when she was being removed from that to Fleet-street, she said, "we have done a good job."

Another watchman corroborated the statement.

Several other witnesses were examined for the defence.

Purcell and Flanagan were found guilty of the stealing, and the Walsh's were acquitted.

The RECORDER. -- The sentence of the court is that you, Michael Purcell, be transported beyond the seas for seven years; and that you, Anne Flanagan, be imprisoned for twelve months and kept to hard labour.

-- Freeman's Journal, Thursday 22 June 1830

The Old Man of the Holy Well, Tobernalt holy well, near to Sligo, County Sligo. Some believe the name may mean "Well of the Insane"(Tobar na nGealt). (Cistercians used the nearby Cottage Island as an asylum for lepers and the insane in medieval times. These people would likely have rowed the short distance across the lake to visit the Holy Well in search of a cure.): photographer unknown, c. 1900-1939 (Eason Photograph Collection, National Library of Ireland)

OPHELIA [sings]:
 
To-morrow is Saint Valentine's day, 
All in the morning betime,
And I a maid at your window, 
To be your Valentine. 
Then up he rose, and donn'd his clothes, 
And dupp'd the chamber-door;
Let in the maid, that out a maid 
Never departed more.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark (1600-1601), Act IV, Scene V

A sad parade of old engines going to scrap, Mullingar, County Westmeath: photo by James O'Dea, 14 February 1963 (O'Dea Photographic Collection, National Library of Ireland)

a soul of winter

February 15, 2016, 9:59 pm

≫ Next: Ted Berrigan: Sonnet XXXVI, Personal Poem #9 and History: What's Uijeongbu Got To Do With It?

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A destroyed MSF-supported hospital in Maarat al-Noaman in Idlib Province, Syria, on Monday, after it was hit by airstrikes: photo by Sam Taylor/Doctors Without Borders, via European Pressphoto Agency, 15 February 2016

Syria: At least seven killed and eight missing in another MSF-supported hospital attack in Idlib province: Médecins Sans Frontières, 15 February 2016

Gaziantep – At least seven people were killed, and at least eight are missing, presumed dead, after a Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF)-supported hospital in Idlib province in northern Syria was destroyed in an attack on Monday morning.

The hospital in Ma’arat Al Numan was hit by four missiles in two attacks within a few minutes of each other, according to staff from the hospital. Around 15 other houses and structures located in populated zones were struck in the area, including reports of another non-MSF-supported hospital during Monday morning.

“The destruction on the MSF supported facility appears to be a deliberate attack on a health structure”, denounces Massimiliano Rebaudengo, MSF’s Head of Mission.

Five patients were killed, as well as one caretaker. In addition, a hospital guard was killed and eight members of staff are missing, presumed dead. Other patients are still missing, but their numbers are currently unknown.

“The destruction of the hospital leaves the local population of around 40,000 people without access to medical services in an active zone of conflict,” Massimiliano said.

There were also reports on Monday morning of another two hospitals in Azaz city being attacked. These facilities were not supported by MSF.

The 30-bed hospital in Ma’arat Al Numan had 54 staff, two operating theatres, an outpatient department and an emergency room. The outpatient department treated around 1500 people a month, the ER carried out an average of 1,100 consultations a month, and around 140 operations a month, mainly orthopaedic and general surgery, were carried out in the operating theatres.

MSF has been supporting this hospital since September 2015 and covered all the needs of the facility including provision of medical supplies and running costs.

In December 2015 MSF supported the reconstruction of the hospital after it had been forced to move from the previous location after being attacked three times.

Fighting also intensified in Azaz district about 100 kms away from Ma’arat Al Numan on Monday morning, and MSF’s Al Salamah hospital has so far received 10 war wounded patients. A mother and child hospital (not supported by MSF) has also been bombed in Azaz city, the hospital is organizing the setup of its pediatric operating theatre into MSF's Al Salamah hospital.

Horrific details from Syrian doctor who witnessed @MSF hospital airstrikes, via @borzou: image via Francis Whittaker @frittaker,15 February 2016

A hospital supported by Doctors Without Borders near Maaret Numan, in Syria's northern Idlib province, lies in ruins after being hit by airstrikes that activists say were carried out by Russian warplanes: photo by AFP, 15 February 2016
 

Dozens of civilians killed in missile attacks on schools and medical centers in Syria, U.N. says: Associated Press, 15 February 2016

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Monday that nearly 50 civilians have been killed and many more wounded in missile attacks on at least five medical facilities and two schools in northern Syria.

Ban called the attacks “blatant violations of international laws” that “are further degrading an already devastated healthcare system and preventing access to education in Syria,” according to U.N. deputy spokesman Farhan Haq. 

Haq quoted Ban as saying the attacks “cast a shadow on commitments” that nations seeking to end the Syrian conflict made at a conference in Munich, Germany, on Thursday; those included a cessation of hostilities within a week and an end to attacks on civilians.

Opposition activists had said airstrikes hit hospitals and a school in northern Syria, killing and wounding dozens of people. The activists said the strikes were carried out by Russian warplanes supporting a major advance by government troops.

An airstrike in Idlib province destroyed a makeshift clinic supported by the international aid group Doctors Without Borders, and in neighboring Aleppo province, a missile struck a children's hospital in the town of Azaz, killing at least five people and wounding dozens. A third airstrike hit a school in a nearby village, killing seven and wounding others.

Doctors Without Borders, also known by its French acronym MSF, said in a statement that the hospital in the town of Maaret Numan was hit four times in at least two attacks that were minutes apart. It said at least seven people were killed and at least eight others were "missing, presumed dead."

"This appears to be a deliberate attack on a health structure, and we condemn this attack in the strongest possible terms," said Massimiliano Rebaudengo, MSF's Syria mission chief. "The destruction of the hospital leaves the local population of around 40,000 people without access to medical services in an active zone of conflict."

The aid group said the hospital had 30 beds, 54 staff members, two operating theaters, an outpatient department and an emergency room. MSF has been supporting the hospital since September and covered all its needs, including medical supplies and running costs, it said.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Russian warplanes targeted the makeshift hospital, destroying it and killing nine people. The opposition group, which tracks both sides of the conflict through sources on the ground, said dozens were wounded in the attack.

Syrian troops have been advancing in the north under the cover of Russian airstrikes in recent weeks. The offensive has been focused on Aleppo province, where troops are trying to cut rebel supply lines to Turkey and surround rebel-held parts of the northern city of Aleppo, once Syria's largest.

On Monday, Syrian state TV reported that pro-government gunmen have entered western parts of the northern town of Tel Rifaat, where they were fighting "fierce battles" against insurgents. Tal Rifaat is a major stronghold of militants fighting to overthrow President Bashar Assad.

Opposition activist Yahya al Sobeih, speaking by phone from Maaret Numan, said "the entire building has collapsed on the ground." He said five people were killed near the MSF clinic and "all members of the medical team inside are believed to be dead."

Paramedics and volunteers were working on removing the rubble, he added. The four-story building was once a cement company, but had served as a makeshift clinic during the war, Al Sobeih said.

The missile attack in Azaz, near the Turkish border, killed five people at the hospital, including three children and a pregnant woman, and wounded more than 30, the Syrian Observatory said. Activist Baraa al Halaby, based in Aleppo, said the hospital was struck by a missile and that 10 people were killed.

Abdulrahman al Hassan, chief liaison officer of Syrian Civil Defense, a group of first responders known as the "White Helmets," said the women's hospital in Azaz was hit by two surface-to-surface missiles. He added that some 10 people were killed and many were wounded.

"We think it is Russia because the photos of the missiles have Russian language [and] because we haven't seen this kind [of missile] before the Russian intervention," he said.

Russia has been a key ally of Assad throughout the five-year uprising and civil war; on Sept. 30, it began launching airstrikes to support his forces.

In Turkey, the private Dogan news agency reported that more than 30 of those wounded in Russian airstrikes in Azaz, primarily children, were transferred to a hospital in southern Turkey. It showed footage of ambulances arriving at the Kilis state hospital, medics unloading children on stretchers and a girl wrapped in a blanket.

"They hit the school, they hit the school," wailed a Syrian woman who was unloaded from an ambulance onto a wheelchair.

The Syrian Observatory and Al Halaby said an airstrike hit a school in the village of Kaljibrin, near Azaz. Al Halaby said the raid killed seven people and wounded others. The observatory said five were killed.

In Brussels on Monday, European Union officials called on Turkey to halt its military action in Syria after Turkish forces shelled positions held by a U.S.-backed Kurdish militia over the weekend.

The EU's foreign policy chief, Federica Mogherini, said that "only a few days ago, all of us including Turkey, sitting around the table, decided steps to de-escalate and have a cessation of hostilities."

She said more fighting "is obviously not what we expect."

Dutch Foreign Minister Bert Koenders, whose country holds the EU's rotating presidency, said, "We have the plan for a cessation of hostilities and I think everybody has to abide by that."

Syria's main Kurdish faction, the People's Protection Units, or YPG, have been highly effective in combating Islamic State militants, but Turkey views it as a threat because of its ties to the Kurdistan Workers' Party which has waged a decades-long insurgency against Ankara.

Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu on Monday said the cross-border shelling has succeeded in halting a Kurdish advance on Azaz and vowed the "harshest reaction" if the YPG march on the town again.

Kurdish-led forces had recently gained ground along the border with Turkey at the expense of Syrian rebels, who have been struggling to hold ground amid the massive Russian-backed government offensive.

In contravention of UN cease fire and #IHL, an MSF-supported hospital was attacked and destroyed this morning in #Syria. The MSF-supported structure in #Idlib  was hit by 4 rockets, at least 8 staff are missing. The hospital was hit four times in two series of at least two attacks within a few minutes of each other #MSF: image via MSF International @MSF. 15 February 2016 

“The destruction of the hospital leaves around 40,000 people without medical services in an active zone of conflict": image via MSF Syria @MSF_Syria, 15 February 2016

Several hospitals operated by @sams_usa were bombed by #Russia today in Idlib and Aleppo killing scores of patients: image via Zaher Sahloul @sahloul, 15 February 2016

A #nurse in training is killed today by the #Russian airstrike on @sams_usa hospital in #Marr'a. She will be missed!: image via Zaher Sahloul @sahloul, 15 February 2016

Today, Azaz hospital OBGYN/ neonatal for women and newborns was attacked and completely demolished by Russian airstrikes: image via SAMS@sams_usa, 15 February 2016

Today, Azaz hospital OBGYN/ neonatal for women and newborns was attacked and completely demolished by Russian airstrikes: image via SAMS@sams_usa, 15 February 2016

Today, Azaz hospital OBGYN/ neonatal for women and newborns was attacked and completely demolished by Russian airstrikes: image via SAMS@sams_usa, 15 February 2016

Russian missile landed in the fields outside Azaz north #Aleppo: image via Stork @NorthernStork, 15 February 2016

Russian missile landed in the fields outside Azaz north #Aleppo: image via Stork @NorthernStork, 15 February 2016

#News Aftermath of a ballistic missile attack on the #Azaz women's and children's hospital: image via Julian Röpcke @JulianRoepcke, 15 February 2016

Bodies outside a makeshift mother and child hospital after reported airstrikes on Monday in the Syrian city of Azaz, near the border with Turkey: photo by Mujahed Abul Joud/Agence France-Presse, 15 February 2016

"Syrians are buried beneath bombs." by @MSF President @JoanneLiu_MSF: image via Arjan Hehenkamp @Arjan Hehenkamp, 15 February 2016

[Too many enemies]: image via baraa al halabi @baraaalhalabi, 13 February 2016

a winter of the soul 

 
Melted snow catches the light atop hundreds of bottles of water ready for distribution outside of a Flint Fire Station in downtown Flint, Michigan: photo by Jake May/The Flint Journal-MLive.com via AP, 28 January 2016

A dropped winter glove marks an entrance to the Boston Common during a snowstorm: photo by Suzanne Kreiter/Boston Globe, 8 February 2016

Snowfall brought winter conditions back to parts of the UK as overnight snow closed the Snake Pass in the Peak District of England: photo by John Giles/ PA via AP, 3 February 2016

Morning mist sits in the valley of the Spey River near Kincraig, Scotland: photo by Russell Cheyne/Reuters, 12 February 2016

Alpine choughs start from the summit of the 2,224 meters high Nebelhorn mountain near Oberstdorf, southern Germany, flying towards a snow-covered Alpine panorama: photo by Karl-Josef Hildenbrand/AFP, 9 February 2016

A gull flies over the Mediterranean Sea as the sun rises over snow-covered Mount Sannine, in Beirut, Lebanon: photo by Hassan Ammar/Associated Press, 8 February 2016

A Kashmiri man walks over a snow-covered log bridge on the outskirts of Srinagar.: photo by Farooq Khan/EPA, 12 February 2016

Kashmiri people try to warm themselves amid snowfall in Tangmarg, north of Srinagar: photo by Farooq Khan/EPA, 11 February 2016

A pedestrian smokes a cigarette as she walks on a snow covered pathway in Alta, northern Norway: photo by Alastair Grant/Associated Press, 1 February 2016

A road sign “163 km” is seen on a birch on a winter road at a market near the Siberian village of Yangutum: photo by Alexander Aksakov, 2 February 2016

A woman walks past snow-covered trees in a forest near the village of Mesherskoye some 70 km outside Moscow: photo by Yuri Kabodnokov/AFP, 1 February 2016

Russian woman walks during a snowfall near the Holly Trinity New-Golutvin Convent on the Cathedral Square inside the Kolomna Kremlin in Kolomna, Russia: photo by Sergei Ilnitsky/EPA, 12 February 2016

Water from the overflowing Diemeltal lock rushes over a gate in the wall in Diemelsee, Germany. The cause is a high inflow of water from snow that is melting due to recent mild temperatures and rainfall.: photo by Uwe Zucchi/EPA, 11 February 2016

A wave breaks in the harbour in Auderville, northwestern France #AFP photo by @CTriballeau: image by Sophie Nicholson @sohnic, 8 February 2016

Sleep No More Till Spring Comes, or The Long Winter's Night of The Living Dead Zombiegirls

@AlexanderWangNY presented last night his #FW16 collection in a church: image via NOWFASHION @NOWFASHION, 14 February 2016  

A model walks the walk of the living dead in the Alexander Wang fall-winter 2016 collection for New York Fashion Week, shown at St Bartholomews Church on Park Avenue: photo by Nowfashion/The New York Times, 14 February 2016

The Alexander Wang fall-winter 2016 collection for New York Fashion Week, shown at St Bartholomews Church on Park Avenue, zeroed in on today’s youth culture and its various appropriations of high fashion: photo by Dina Litovsky via The New York Times, 14 February 2016

 


The Alexander Wang fall-winter 2016 collection for New York Fashion Week, shown at St Bartholomews Church on Park Avenue, zeroed in on today’s youth culture and its various appropriations of high fashion: photo by Dina Litovsky via The New York Times, 14 February 2016

 

Mohair, a throwback to ’90s grunge, featured prominently in the collection, especially in the form of beanies: photo by Dina Litovsky via The New York Times, 14 February 2016

Several pieces referenced prison uniforms, including a coat with “County” emblazoned on the back. Shown here, a literal poser's take on jail stripes.: photo by Dina Litovsky via The New York Times, 14 February 2016



Given the church’s layout, engineering space was a tricky feat. Here, photographers clustered uncomfortably at one end of the runway.: photo by Dina Litovsky via The New York Times, 14 February 2016

 

Models appear only moderately brutalized while waiting outside their rehearsal: photo by Dina Litovsky via The New York Times, 14 February 2016
  

 
Captions such as “strict,” “girls” and “tender” were displayed across chests on rectangular black patches simplistically resembling censorship bands: photo by Dina Litovsky via The New York Times, 14 February 2016

Not one for subtlety, especially when it comes to celebrating subversiveness, Wang delivered prints of marijuana leaves on coats and miniskirts: photo by Dina Litovsky via The New York Times, 14 February 2016

Not one for subtlety, especially when it comes to celebrating subversiveness, Wang delivered prints of marijuana leaves on coats and miniskirts: photo by Dina Litovsky via The New York Times, 14 February 2016

The crowd included heavyweights from both the fashion and entertainment industries. Here, Anna Wintour, an early champion of Wang’s work (Wang  won the CFDA Vogue Fashion Fund Award in 2008).: photo by Dina Litovsky via The New York Times, 14 February 2016

 

The crowd included heavyweights from both the fashion and entertainment industries. Here, Anna Wintour, an early champion of Wang’s work (Wang  won the CFDA Vogue Fashion Fund Award in 2008).: photo by Dina Litovsky via The New York Times, 14 February 2016

the moments in between: photo by Naud, 4 July 2013

living dead zombie girl: photo by smilz4u18, 13 April 2007

Zombie girl. Montreal Zombie walk 2014: photo by Celine Marsolais, 25 October 2014

Final touchups with #Fekkai + @NARSissist backstage at @NoonbyNoor #Fall16. #NYFW: image via Fekkai @fekkai, 14 February 2016

#zombie #zombies #zombiegirl #facepaint #bodypaint #mua #makeup: image via Rene H. Nielsen, 1 February 2016

Diane Kendal created the "sleep no more" look for @NARSissist and #AlexanderWang: image via CR FASHION BOOK @CR FASHION BOOK, 14 February 2016

#ContestAlert: win some #ZombieGirl swag! Enter by Feb.29: image via AG @the poeticzombie, 8 February 2016

That special sallow, waxen, my nose-has-known-the-armpits-of-the-dead Six Feet Under afterglow -- How to look like a member of #AlexanderWangNY's downtown gang #NYFW: image via CR FASHION BOOK @CR FASHION BOOK, 14 February 2016

#ZombieGirl: image via Muh Fucka @GhostRunner24, 9 February 2016

Yes, the #zombie apocalypse will void @amazon's terms of service: image via CNNMoney @CNNMoney, 11 February 2016

Check out the images of #AlexanderWang  first - polaroid - campaign after #BALENCIAGA: image via NsMagazine @nssmag, 10 February 2016  Lombardy, Italy

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Ted Berrigan: Sonnet XXXVI, Personal Poem #9 and History: What's Uijeongbu Got To Do With It?

February 16, 2016, 9:19 pm

≫ Next: Alun Lewis: Raiders' Dawn

≪ Previous: a soul of winter

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A US soldier wears a gas mask during a competition to test individual skills at a US Army base in Uijeongbu, north of Seoul, on Wednesday. The goal of the competition is to foster esprit de corps across the units participating and to continue to strengthen the US-South Korea alliance: photo by Jung Yeon-Jejung/AFP, 8 July 2015

Portraits of Kim Il Sung, left, and Kim Jong Il, at the entrance of the Pyongyang Indoor Stadium on the “Day of the Shining Star,” the birthday of Kim Jong Il: photo by Wong Maye-E/Associated Press, 16 February 2016

A formation of fighter jets, flown by the South Korean Black Eagles aerial acrobatic team, performed at the Singapore Airshow: photo by Wallace Woon/European Pressphoto Agency, 16 February 2016

South Korea’s Black Eagles aerobatics team flying KAI T-50B aircraft perform an aerial display during the Singapore Airshow at the Changi exhibition centre in Singapore on Tuesday: photo by AFP, 16 February 2016

 An object rising above North Korean territory as seen from the Chinese border city of Dandong on Sunday: photo by Kyodo via Reuters, 6 February 2016



A South Korean soldier watches a news report on North Korea’s rocket launch. President Park Geun-hye of South Korea called an emergency meeting of top national security advisers.: photo by Yonhap/Agence France-Presse, 6 February 2016

Daily doodle 070216 #NorthKorea launches long range rocket, which it claims is carrying a "satellite": image via Ruth Wishart @Ruth Wishart, 7 February 2016

S. Korea to suspend joint industrial park over #NorthKorea's rocket launch: image via China Xinhua News @XHNews, 10 February 2016

 #NorthKorea developing weapon that could reach U.S.#nuclear: image via TRUNEWS @TRUNEWS, 16 February 2016

S. #Korea announced Wed. to halt work at joint industrial park with N. Korea over #Pyongyang's recent rocket launch: image via People's Daily, China @PDChina, 10 February 2016

North #Korea's army chief of staff has been executed, South Korean media reported Wednesday #DPRK: image via Mete Sohtaoglu @metesohtaoglu, 10 February 2016

#US sends extra #Patriot missiles to S. #Korea amid rising tensions with North: image via RT @RT, 13 February 2016

North Korea has restarted plutonium reactor, U.S. official reports: image via Yahoo News @YahooNews, 9 February 2016

A South Korean family prays for relatives in the North near the demilitarized border zone to mark the Lunar New Year: image via AFP news agency @AFP, 7 February 2016

Ted Berrigan: Sonnet XXXVI

...................................after Frank O’Hara

It’s 8:54 in Brooklyn it’s the 28th of July and
it’s probably 8:54 in Manhattan but I’m
in Brooklyn I’m eating English muffins and drinking
Pepsi and I’m thinking of how Brooklyn is New
York City too how odd I usually think of it as
something all its own like Bellows Falls like Little
Chute like Uijongbu..............I never thought on the Williams-
burg bridge I’d come so much to Brooklyn
just to see lawyers and cops who don’t even carry
guns taking my wife away and bringing her back
...........................................................No
and I never thought Dick would be back at Gude’s
beard shaved off long hair cut and Carol reading
his books when we were playing cribbage and
watching the sun come up over the Navy Yard
across the river...................I think I was thinking when I was
ahead I’d be somewhere like Perry Street erudite
dazzling slim and badly loved
contemplating my new book of poems
to be printed on simple type on old brown paper
feminine marvelous and tough

Ted Berrigan (1934-1983): Sonnet XXXVI, from The Sonnets, 1964

Street scene, Uijeongbu, South Korea, c. April 1952: photo by Inger Schulstad (1920-2010) (Municipal Archives of Trondheim)

Ted Berrigan: Personal Poem #9

It's 8:54 a.m. in Brooklyn it's the 26th of July
and it's probably 8:54 in Manhattan but I'm
in Brooklyn  I'm eating English muffins and drinking
Pepsi and I'm thinking of how Brooklyn is
New York City too  how odd  I usually think of it
as something all its own like Bellows Falls like
Little Chute  like Uijongbu
                                                      I never thought
on the Williamsburg Bridge I'd come so much to Brooklyn
just to see lawyers and cops who don't even carry guns
taking my wife away and bringing her back
                                                                           No
and I never thought Dick would be back at Gude's
beard shaved off long hair cut and Carol reading
her books when we were playing cribbage and watching
the sun come up over the Navy Yard a-
cross the river                          I think I was thinking
when I was ahead I'd be somewhere like Perry Street
erudite dazzling slim and badly-loved
contemplating my new book of poetry
to be printed in simple type on old brown paper
feminine marvelous and tough

Ted Berrigan: Personal Poem #9, 26 July 1962, from Many Happy Returns, 1969

Site of Norwegian Mobile Army Field Hospital, Uijeongbu, South Korea, sometime in 1952: photo by Inger Schulstad (1920-2010) (Municipal Archives of Trondheim)

Uijeongbu is located north of the Korean capital Seoul. It lies inside a defile, with mountains on two sides, and thus commands a natural choke point across the main traditional invasion route from the North into Seoul. As such it has a continued military significance and it contains U.S. and Korean military bases, positioned for the defense of the Korean capital. The U.S. Second Infantry Division has established a headquarters post in Uijeongbu, with the main troops being deployed from Dongducheon city.

Despite being known for its military presence, the area has boomed into a satellite community of Seoul with shops, cinemas, restaurants and bars, PC bangs and DVD Bangs. In addition to U.S. personnel, it is popular with the English hagwon (a for-profit private institute, academy or cram school). There are several mountains such as Mt. Dobong (Dobongan), Mt. Surak and Mt. Soyo. The mountains are popular recreational areas for hiking and are frequented by residents living in the Seoul Metropolitan area.

This city is also famous for its budae ijigae (lit. "army base stew"), made with hot dogs and SPAM. In the late 20th century, many wanted the dish to be referred as Uijeongbu jjigae to remove the military or war-time connotations associated with it. However, not many restaurants followed this guideline. Some restaurants have begun calling their product Uijeongbu budae jjigae. The city also contains what locals refer to as "buddaejjigae street", a street where there is a high concentration of army base stew restaurants.

US Air Force helicopter landing at Norwegian Mobile Army Field Hospital, Uijeongbu, South Korea, sometime in 1952: photo by Inger Schulstad (1920-2010) (Municipal Archives of Trondheim)

Haircut at Norwegian Mobile Army Field Hospital, Uijeongbu, South Korea, c. April 1952: photo by Inger Schulstad (1920-2010) (Municipal Archives of Trondheim) 

 

 Tents at the edge of camp, Uijeongbu, South Korea, c. April 1952: photo by Inger Schulstad (1920-2010) (Municipal Archives of Trondheim)

House for three, Uijeongbu, South Korea, c. April 1952: photo by Inger Schulstad (1920-2010) (Municipal Archives of Trondheim)

Child scavengers, Uijeongbu, South Korea, c. April 1952: photo by Inger Schulstad (1920-2010) (Municipal Archives of Trondheim)

 

Landscape near Uijeongbu, South Korea, c. April 1952: photo by Inger Schulstad (1920-2010) (Municipal Archives of Trondheim)

 

On the outskirts of Norwegian Mobile Army Field Hospital  /  I utkanten av NORMASH, Uijeongbu, South Korea, c. April 1952: photo by Inger Schulstad (1920-2010) (Municipal Archives of Trondheim) 

Man with abacus, Uijeongbu, South Korea, c. April 1952: photo by Inger Schulstad (1920-2010) (Municipal Archives of Trondheim)



Ted Berrigan (l) and Allen Katzman(c) and Susan Sherman (r) at Le Metro c. 1964-5: photo by Lorenz Gude via Bedford + Bowery

Letter from Ted Berrigan to Sandra Alper (with collaged photos of Ted Berrigan, Lorenz Gude and Dick Gallup), 23 March 1962: image via Coffee House Press

Telegram from Ted Berrigan to Joe Brainard, 13 February 1962: image via Coffee House Press

Collaged wedding announcement by Ted Berrigan, with clipping from Providence (R.I.) Journal-Bulletin: image via Coffee House Press

 Ted Berrigan scrapbook page, n.d.: image via Coffee House Press

 Ted Berrigan scrapbook page, n.d.: image via Coffee House Press

 Ted Berrigan scrapbook page with typescript of Personal Poem #9 (26 July 1962), n.d.: image via Coffee House Press

 Ted Berrigan scrapbook page, n.d.: image via Coffee House Press

Ted Berrigan: The Sonnets, C Press, 1964: image via reality studio

Ted Berrigan reading at Le Metro c. 1964-5 : photo by Lorenz Gude via Bedford + Bowery

A US soldier wears a gas mask during a competition to test individual skills at a US Army base in Uijeongbu, north of Seoul, on Wednesday. The goal of the competition is to foster esprit de corps across the units participating and to continue to strengthen the US-South Korea alliance: photo by Jung Yeon-Jejung/AFP, 8 July 2015

Soldiers from the South Korean army special forces unit demonstrate their skills in fighting back knife-wielding attackers during a martial arts demonstration for Children’s Day at the War Museum in Seoul on Tuesday: photo by Ahn Young-joon/AP, 5 May 2015
.
  

A photographer takes pictures of South Korean army soldiers involved in a US/South Korea live-fire military exercise at a training field in Pocheon, south of the demilitarized zone: photo by Kim Hong-Ji/Reuters, 25 March 2015

A new South Korean military officer runs into an echelon as they attend a joint commissioning ceremony for 6,478 new officers from the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines at the military headquarters in Gyeryong on Thursday: photo by Kim Hong-Ji/Reuters, 12 March 2015

South Korean army soldiers move during their military exercise near the demilitarized zone between the two Koreas in Paju, South Korea. North Korea on Monday fired two short-range ballistic missiles into the sea and warned of “merciless strikes” against its enemies as allies Seoul and Washington launched annual military drills: photo by Ahn Young-joon/AP, 2 March 2015

Alun Lewis: Raiders' Dawn

February 17, 2016, 10:33 pm

≫ Next: Ugandan Elections: Boxed Out / Joseph Ceravolo: where is the guide, O Hermes

≪ Previous: Ted Berrigan: Sonnet XXXVI, Personal Poem #9 and History: What's Uijeongbu Got To Do With It?

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Russian cadets rest in the dance hall at the Presidential Cadet School of the Internal Troops of Russia in Moscow, an institution created by President Vladimir V. Putin: photo by Sergei Ilnitsky/European Pressphoto Agency, 17 February 2015

Russian cadets rest in the dance hall at the Presidential Cadet School of the Internal Troops of Russia in Moscow, an institution created by President Vladimir V. Putin: photo by Sergei Ilnitsky/European Pressphoto Agency, 17 February 2015

Softly the civilized
Centuries fall,
Paper on paper,
Peter on Paul.

And lovers walking
From the night --
Eternity’s masters,
Slaves of Time --
Recognize only
The drifting white
Fall of small faces  
In pits of lime.

Blue necklace left
On a charred chair
Tells that Beauty
Was startled there.

Alun Lewis (1915-1944): Raiders' Dawn, from Raiders' Dawn and Other Poems, 1942

Supporters of leading opposition leader and presidential candidate Kizza Besigye cower in a shop doorway after riot police fired tear gas at them and Besigye when they attempted to walk along a street in downtown Kampala, Uganda: photo by Ben Curtis/AP, 15 February 2016

Protesters struggle to assist one another after the police fired tear gas near Artvin, in northeastern Turkey, to stop a demonstration against a gold mine planned nearby: photo by Yasin Akgul/Agence France-Press, 17 February 2016

An investor checks stock prices at a terminal in a securities company in Beijing: photo by Greg Baker/AFP, 17 February 2016

A series of craters caused by the US bombardments in Ban Khay, Xieng Khouang province. Hundreds of craters still dot the landscape of the area: photo by Matilde Gattoni/Tandem Reportage via The Observer, 31 January 2015



Lady Gaga performs a tribute to Davie Bowie at the Grammys: photo by Mario Anzuoni/Reuters, 16 February 2016

Buan Kham lost her lower right leg when a 500lb bomb her husband had stored beneath the house exploded: photo by Matilde Gattoni/Tandem Reportage via The Observer, 31 January 2015

Chan Duong Ly, 85, a monk at the Wat Phia Wat monastery in Muang Khoun, the former capital of Xieng Khouang province. The city was extensively bombed during the war and almost totally abandoned in 1975. The monastery, which dates back to 1322, was bombed by the US in 1966 because it was suspected of having been converted into a food storage area used by the North Vietnamese. The blackened and scarred Buddha statue in the monastery courtyard is among the few remains of the pre-war period: photo by Matilde Gattoni/Tandem Reportage via The Observer, 31 January 2015

Tham Piu cave, on the outskirts of Muang Khoun. Laos. Here, on 24 November 1968, a US strike killed 374 civilians who were sheltering in the cave in order to find refuge from the American bombardments: photo by Matilde Gattoni/Tandem Reportage via The Observer, 31 January 2015

Kampuang Dalaseng lies on the ground demonstrating how he would hide from the bombs during the Secret War in Laos. ‘I hate Americans to this date. They bombed, burned and destroyed everything. If their president was here, I would slap him in the face.’ A former professor of French, 84-year-old Kampuang lived under the American bombardments for five years: photo by Matilde Gattoni/Tandem Reportage via The Observer, 31 January 2015.

Nyoua Yang, 16, from Nam Kha, lost her right eye one afternoon in 2009, when the hoe she was using to clear the grass from her family’s rice field hit a cluster bomb. ‘ I just remember a small explosion, then a piece of shrapnel went into my eye.’ Yang, who was 11 at that time, lost her eye after a doctor refused to operate on her because she was too young.: photo by Matilde Gattoni/Tandem Reportage via The Observer, 31 January 2015

Hillary Clinton has long invoked Henry Kissinger as a mentor -- her infamous emails show that they corresponded with some frequency when she was secretary of state. Kissinger, architect of the "Operation Menu"  covert bombing campaign in Laos and Cambodia in 1969-70, is widely perceived as a war criminal. He also won a Nobel Peace Prize: photo by Dirck Halstead via The Guardian, 13 February 2016

Prosthetic arms on display at the COPE Visitor Centre, Vientiane. COPE is a local not-for-profit organisation providing access to prosthetic devices and rehabilitation services to people with disabilities. One third of its patients are UXO-related victims: photo by Matilde Gattoni/Tandem Reportage via The Observer, 31 January 2015

Glad to see people aren't letting his crimes go unnoticed. If the U.S. cares about war crimes, start with #Kissinger: image via Matthew Yoder @MrMarbless92, 10 February 2015

 

[By 8 December 1970] U.S. efforts to interdict the trail were in full swing with the USAF's Operation Igloo White. Electronic surveillance devices were dropped to monitor vehicle-and-troop movement in Laos, and a constant orbit of manned and drone planes relayed the signals from under the jungle blanket to the Infiltration Surveillance Center in Thailand. There, two computers processed high-speed printouts showing which sensors had been activated, how often, and when. Other computers fed this information to an Airborne Battlefield Command and Control aircraft which then called in appropriate air power. A typical day over Laos saw the Ho Chi Minh Trail hit by thirty B52 bomber strikes and three hundred USAF, USN, and USMC aircraft. C130 transport planes, mounted with Gatling mini-guns, flew night and day to strafe convoys and troop marches. Bombs mounted with lasers and televisions were sent against cave entrances. Cluster bombs were sowed over Binh Trams. Mines and booby-traps were airdropped, some designed to demolish trucks, others to mangle a man's foot so he became a burden to his comrades. The destruction was staggering...

Keith William Nolan: from Into Laos: The Story of Dewey Canyon II/Lam Son 719, Vietnam 1971

A man sells key-chains in the shape of Pope Francis in downtown Morelia, in the Mexican state of Michoacan: photo by Tomas Bravo/Reuters, 16 February 2016

#PhotoOfTheYear #CodePink making #CitizensArrest of #WarCriminal #Kissinger #JustBrilliant #IWishIWasThere: image via Ruthanasia #BDS @Ruthanasia, 2 February 2015

Ugandan Elections: Boxed Out / Joseph Ceravolo: where is the guide, O Hermes

February 19, 2016, 8:52 pm

≫ Next: Walter de La Mare: Napoleon: ideological ascendancy in the least rational campaign in recent memory

≪ Previous: Alun Lewis: Raiders' Dawn

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Second day of voting in chaotic Uganda election: image via AFP news agency @AFP, 19 February 2016

A police officer sprays tear gas on a protester apprehended on Day 2 of Uganda's elections @AFP @AFPphoto: image via AFPAfrica news agency @AFPAfrica, 19 February 2016

Ugandan police clash with opposition protesters a day after the presidential election: image via Reuters Pictures @reuterspictures, 19 February 2016

Ugandan police clash with opposition protesters a day after the presidential election: image via Reuters Pictures @reuterspictures, 19 February 2016

Ugandan police clash with opposition protesters a day after the presidential election: image via Reuters Pictures @reuterspictures, 19 February 2016

Joseph Ceravolo: where is the guide, O Hermes

 

Ugandans start casting votes on Thursday to decide whether to give Yoweri Museveni, in power for three decades, another term in office: photo by Ben Curtis/AP, 18 February 2016

 

Ugandans start casting votes on Thursday to decide whether to give Yoweri Museveni, in power for three decades, another term in office: photo by Ben Curtis/AP, 18 February 2016

 

 

Joseph Ceravolo: where is the guide, O Hermes

....,,March 31, 1988

A man listens to music next to me, and
a woman next to him listens
to music, and a woman reads next to her.
Two men talk, one a white boy
the other a black white bearded man

describing the stops along the tracks.
Sweet descriptions and voices

of holy mankind, holy rites

along the route to Troy.

 

But where is the warrior and where

is the guide, O Hermes

in the drafty Spring moonlight

where wind shakes apart tears

that soldiers keep to themselves

even in the music of the trees that set

them free along the holy ring of stars

in the destruction of the world
 

Joseph Ceravolo (1934-1988): Untitled (March 31, 1988), from Collected Poems, 2013

A Ugandan soldier stands guard in front of posters for opposition leader Kizza Besigye and other candidates in the parliamentary elections: photo by Ben Curtis/AP, 19 February 2016

Ugandan Forces Use Strong-Arm Tactics Amid Presidential Vote: The Associated Press, 10 February 2016

KAMPALA, Uganda — Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni's security forces used strong-arm tactics in the middle of an election Friday, arresting the main opposition candidate, beating protesters and firing tear gas and stun grenades at them in the capital.

The United States, which gives financial support to this East African nation and helps train its military, was among those condemning the brutal actions. It occurred as voting from Thursday's election continued in two main districts Friday because ballots and other election materials had not arrived on election day.

Early returns Friday put Museveni ahead of opposition leader Kizza Besigye, but votes remained to be cast and counted in Besigye strongholds.

With results from about 47 percent of polling stations across the country counted, Museveni had about 63 percent of the vote and Besigye had about 33 percent, the election commission said late Friday. Final results are expected on Saturday.

Police surrounded the headquarters of Besigye's Forum for Democratic Change party as he was meeting with party members, and a helicopter fired tear gas at a crowd outside. 

Then police moved in and took Besigye, a 59-year-old doctor, to an unknown location, according to Semujju Nganda, a spokesman for the FDC.

Police spokesman Fred Enanga said Besigye was transferred for his own safety and because police wanted to talk to him "to exercise restraint until the final results are announced." Besigye was driven to his home and his movements are not restricted, he said.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry spoke over the phone Friday with Museveni "to underscore that Uganda's progress depends on adherence to democratic principles in the ongoing election process," the U.S. State Department said.

Kerry "expressed his concern about the detentions of ... Besigye and harassment of opposition party members during voting and tallying and urged President Museveni to rein in the police and security forces."

The U.S. Embassy said on Twitter that "We strongly condemn the disproportionate police action taken today at FDC HQ in Kampala."

After Besigye's arrest, his supporters took to the streets. Riot police lobbed tear gas and stun grenades at them and fired warning shots from automatic rifles, then chased them through narrow alleyways, arresting some. Armored personnel carriers rumbled up and down the main street in Kampala. A woman and her children fled on a motorbike.

In nearby poor neighborhoods, people set up burning barricades, which riot police and military police quickly took down. Angry protesters also erected barricades of stones on the highway leading to Uganda's international airport. Police fired tear gas and whacked protesters with sticks.

Muthoni Wanyeki, Amnesty International's regional director, noted that the raid represented a "restriction on the rights to freedom of association and peaceful assembly. The security forces must act with restraint."

The spokesman for the U.N. secretary-general, Stephane Dujarric, said Ban Ki-moon was concerned over the reports of "detentions and violence" and trusts that "the authorities and all stakeholders will ensure that the fundamental rights and the will of the people of Uganda be respected."

Police parked trucks near the home of presidential candidate Amama Mbabazi, a former prime minister. Josephine Mayanja-Nkangi, a spokeswoman for Mbabazi, said he interpreted the deployment to mean he cannot leave his house.

The voting Thursday suffered delays in delivery of voting materials, especially in areas seen as opposition strongholds. Voting was taking place Friday at 36 polling stations in Kampala and the neighboring district of Wakiso.

The government had shut down social media sites such as Twitter and Facebook but many Ugandans were circumventing that by using virtual private networks, or VPNs.

Besigye was also briefly arrested late Thursday after visiting a house in Kampala where he suspected ballot-stuffing was taking place. Police said the house was a security facility and accused Besigye of trespassing on government property.

Museveni, 71, took power in 1986 and pulled Uganda out of years of chaos after a guerrilla war. He is a key U.S. ally on security matters, especially in Somalia. His critics worry he may want to rule for life, and accuse him of using security forces to intimidate and harass the opposition.

Besigye, 59, was Museveni's personal physician during a war and served as deputy interior minister in Museveni's first Cabinet. He broke with the president in 1999.

"The military is now all over the place. It's a show of force. They are saying, 'We are ready to kill you if you protest,'" said Mwambutsya Ndebesa, a professor of history at Uganda's Makerere University. "Museveni has overstretched the goodwill Ugandans gave him. It is going to be very bad for him in terms of legitimacy."

Pedestrians walk past campaign posters for long-time President Yoweri Museveni, as well as for local members of Parliament, on a street in Kampala: photo by Ben Curtis/AP, 18 February 2016

 

 

Pedestrians walk past campaign posters for long-time President Yoweri Museveni, as well as for local members of Parliament, on a street in Kampala: photo by Ben Curtis/AP, 18 February 2016

A ballot box is seen in a polling station just before people start voting during elections in Kaabong in Karamoja region, Uganda: photo by Goran Tomasevic/Reuters, 18 February 2016


 

People queue to cast their ballots in a polling station during elections in Kirihura in western Uganda: photo by James Akena/Reuters, 18 February 2016


 

Ugandans went to the polls on Thursday as President Yoweri Museveni, in power for 30 years, is facing his tightest race ever with opposition leader Kizza Besigye his main challenger: photo by Ben Curtis/AP, 18 February 2016

 

 

On the eve of presidential elections, a heavy police and military presence can be seen in the capital Kampala: photo by Ben Curtis/AP, 18 February 2016


 

Voters queue at the National Theatre polling station, one of the few in the capital which two hours after voting was due to start had received ballot boxes and papers, in Kampala: photo by Ben Curtis/AP, 18 February 2016



A woman casts her vote at the National Theatre polling station: photo by Ben Curtis/AP, 18 February 2016

Post electoral violence in #Uganda. 5 civilians and one policeman dead. #UgandaElections: image via President Vusani @Vusani. 19 February 2016

 

At least one person was killed in Uganda's capital Kampala on Monday in the worst outbreak of violence yet during campaigning for the forthcoming presidential election on February 18. Police spokesman Fred Enanga confirmed on Tuesday that one civilian was killed in the scuffles and that police fired tear gas and rubber bullets to disperse supporters of presidential candidate Kizza Besigye.: photo by Ben Curtis/AP, 16 February 2016


Opposition supporters gesture in front of policemen in the capital Kampala: photo by Goran Tomasevic/Reuters, 16 February 2016

 

Uganda riot policemen pass by an injured protester during clashes in Kampala: photo by Goran Tomasevic/Reuters, 16 February 2016

 

 

The outbreak of violence came just three days before presidential and parliamentary elections due to take place on February 18: photo by Goran Tomasevic/Reuters, 16 February 2016

 

 

A journalist runs in front of riot police in Kampala: photo by Goran Tomasevic/Reuters, 16 February 2016

 

 

Opposition leader Kizza Besigye flashes the victory sign from his vehicle, as it is towed away by an armoured personnel carrier after he was prevented by police from reaching one of his campaign rallies, near to Makerere University in Kampala, Uganda: photo by Ben Curtis/AP, 16 February 2016

 

A female opposition supporter screams in pain in Kampala. photo by Goran Tomasevic/Reuters, 16 February 2016

Residents hide behind a metal shop security grille as outside riot police chase angry opposition supporters: photo by Ben Curtis/AP, 16 February 2016

The country is using a new biometric system to verify voters, but tests for the system only began in recent weeks, leaving little time to train staff at polling stations nationwide: photo by Goran Tomasevic/Reuters, 16 February 2016

 

Masses dispersed as deployed police battle it out with FDC supporters #UgandaDecides: image via NTV UGANDA @ntvuganda, 19 February 2016

 

Police and army seal off Mbabazi's home #UgandaDecides: image via Daily Monitor @DailyMonitor, 19 February 2016

 

EARLIER: Police officers walk into the FDC HQ to order FDC party officials out. #UgandaDecides: image via NTV UGANDA @ntvuganda, 19 February 2016

EARLIER: Police officers walk into the FDC HQ to order FDC party officials out. #UgandaDecides: image via NTV UGANDA @ntvuganda, 19 February 2016

EARLIER: Police officers walk into the FDC HQ to order FDC party officials out. #UgandaDecides: image via NTV UGANDA @ntvuganda, 19 February 2016

EARLIER: Police officers walk into the FDC HQ to order FDC party officials out. #UgandaDecides: image via NTV UGANDA @ntvuganda, 19 February 2016

 

Arrested. Again.#UgandaDecides: image via AJE News @AJENews 19 February 2016

 

#UgandaDecides FDC Flag bearer Dr Besigye 2 hold a press conference immediately aftr his release frm Nagalama police: image via Sudhir Byaruhunga @Sudhimtv, 19 February 2016

Uganda police is spraying teargas into the offices here at our headquarters. #UgandaDecides: image via FDC Official #FDCOfficial1, 19 February 2016

 

.Ugandan Forces Crack Down on Protesters Amid Vote Counting #UgandaDecides: image via Hot Beak World @HotBeakWorld, 19 February 2016

 

#Uganda's only female presidential candidate. #UgandaDecides: image via BBC Africa @BBCAfrica, 18 February 2016

 

#Uganda police statement explaining 'arrest' of opposition candidate @kizzabesigye1 on election day #UgandaDecides: image via Rachael Akidi @rakidi, 28 February 2016

 

#Uganda : Ggabba, voting station closed without anybody voted yet. Police arresting protesters: image via simone schlindwein @schlindweinsim, 19 February 2016

#Uganda : Ggabba, total Chaos, thousands of ppl shouting, I ve covered 6elections in 8yrs+never seen chaos like that: image via simone schlindwein @schlindweinsim, 19 February 2016

Post electoral violence in #Uganda. 5 civilians and one policeman dead. #UgandaElections: image via President Vusani @Vusani. 19 February 2016

Post electoral violence in #Uganda. 5 civilians and one policeman dead. #UgandaElections: image via President Vusani @Vusani. 19 February 2016

 

Voting delays in Uganda as Museveni eyes fifth term: image via AFP news agency @AFP, 18 February 2016

 

#UPDATE Uganda police fire tear gas at voters angered by delays: image via AFP news agency @AFP, 18 February 2016

 

#UPDATE Uganda poll delays 'inexcusable': Commonwealth observer chief: image via AFP news agency @AFP, 18 February 2016

 

 

Ugandan president Yoweri Musageni, who has been in power for 30 years, arrives with  his wife, Janet, at a campaign rally in Kampala: photo by Dai Kurokawa/European Pressphoto Agency, 18 February 2016


  

The leading opposition figure is a former army doctor, Kizza Besigye, who is now making his fourth bid for president: photo by Dai Kurokawa/European Pressphoto Agency, 18 February 2016

 

Karamojong tribesmen in colourful hats traveling near the town of Kaabong, Uganda: photo by Goran Tomasevic/Reuters, 17 February 2015

 
A Karamojong tribesman in a colourful hat traveling near the town of Kaabong, Uganda: photo by Goran Tomasevic/Reuters, 17 February 2015

A voter stretches her arms as she waits in line to cast her ballot with other Ugandans in Kampala, the capital, on an election day marred by the arrest of a top opposition leader and the late delivery of voting materials: photo by Ben Curtis/Associated Press, 18 February 2016

Voters wait in line to cast their ballots in Kampala, the Ugandan capital, on an election day marred by the arrest of a top opposition leader and the late delivery of voting materials: photo by Ben Curtis/Associated Press, 18 February 2016

#Uganda - police officer sat on MP Nabilah Sempala during arrest of opposition leader Besigye Via @chapter4uganda: image via Samira Sawiani @samirasawiani, 15 February 2016

 Bodyguards piled on top of Kizza Besigye, the opposition leader, as the riot police fired tear gas in Kampala, Uganda, on Monday: photo by Ben Curtis/Associated Press, 15 February 2016

 

Bodyguards piled on top of Kizza Besigye, the opposition leader, as the riot police fired tear gas in Kampala, Uganda, on Monday: photo by Ben Curtis/Associated Press, 15 February 2016

A woman sits against a wall plastered with campaign posters for opposition leader Kizza Besigye, as well as for local members of Parliament, in Kampala, Uganda. On the eve of presidential elections, a heavy police and military presence could be seen in the capital Kampala.: photo by Ben Curtis/AP, 17 February 2016



A woman sits against a wall plastered with campaign posters for opposition leader Kizza Besigye, as well as for local members of Parliament, in Kampala, Uganda. On the eve of presidential elections, a heavy police and military presence could be seen in the capital Kampala.: photo by Ben Curtis/AP, 17 February 2016 
 

Tear gas and scuffles as Ugandan presidential challenger Kizza Besigye held by police @AFP: image via AFP Africa @AFPAfrica, 15 February 2016

 

Supporters of leading opposition leader and presidential candidate Kizza Besigye cower in a shop doorway after riot police fired tear gas at them and Besigye when they attempted to walk along a street in downtown Kampala, Uganda: photo by Ben Curtis/AP, 15 February 2016

Ugandans queue to cast their vote in presidential and parliamentary polls in Kampala: photo by Carl De Souza/AFP, 18 February 2016

 

Ugandans start voting as President Museveni eyes the start of a fourth decade in power @AFP: image via AFP Africa @AFPAfrica, 18 February 2016

Walter de La Mare: Napoleon: ideological ascendancy in the least rational campaign in recent memory

February 20, 2016, 10:31 pm

≫ Next: Broken Boats / Bertolt Brecht: In Times of Extreme Persecution

≪ Previous: Ugandan Elections: Boxed Out / Joseph Ceravolo: where is the guide, O Hermes

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Donald Trump after his big victory Saturday night. But he will now face a less divided mainstream field: photo by Jim Wilson/The New York Times, 20 February 2016 

Walter de La Mare: Napoleon

'What is the world, O soldiers?
    It is I;
I, this incessant snow,
  This northern sky;
Soldiers, this solitude
  Through which we go
    Is I.'

Walter de la Mare (1973-1956): Napoleon

 

Donald J. Trump in Spartanburg, S.C., with his wife and family on Saturday night: photo by Jim Wilson/The New York Times, 20 February 2016

Donald J. Trump greeted fans at his rally at a farm in Walterboro, S.C., on Wednesday: photo by Jim Wilson/The New York Times 17 February 2016

 

Supporters of Donald Trump in North Augusta, S.C., on Wednesday: photo by Stephen B. Morton for The New York Times, 17 February 2016


Donald Trump addressing a rally on Friday at the Pawleys Plantation Golf and Country Club in Pawleys Island, S.C. In comments televised on Thursday, Mr. Trump expressed support for the main tenet of the Affordable Care Act. Less than 24 hours later, he distanced himself from the remark.: photo by Jim Wilson/The New York Times, 19 February 2016

 

First Minister Nicola Sturgeon officially opens Glasgow Vaults, Scotland’s first independent safety deposit box service: photo by Danny Lawson/PA, 19 February 2016

An Islamic State fighter gestures while being held as prisoner with fellow fighters under Democratic Forces of Syria fighters as they ride a pick-up truck near al-Shadadi town, Hasaka countryside Syria: photo by Reuters, 19 February 2016

 

During a job-hunting pep rally in Tokyo, a Japanese college graduate publicly vowed to do her best to find work: photo by Thomas Peter/Reuters. 19 February 2016

 Through broken windows in Debaltseve, Ukraine, separatists’ vehicles could be seen.work: photo by Baz Ratner/Reuters. 19 February 2016



Working on a skewer of barbecued mutton at a Lunar New Year fair in Beijing: photo by Baz Ratner/Reuters. 19 February 2015


After a winter storm on Friday, a prayer at the Western Wall in Jerusalem: photo by Sebastian Scheiner/Associated Press, 19 February 2016

Kosovo police officers eeraing gas masks inspect the parliament, after tear gas was launched by opposition lawmakers, disrupting the first parliamentary session of the year: photo by Armend Nimani via FT Photo Diary, 19 February 2016

Items belonging to migrants from Africa hung on a border fence between Morocco and the enclave of Melilla, Spain, after the migrants tried to cross into Spanish territory: photo by Jesus Blasco de Avellaneda/Reuters, 18 February 2016

Family members stood outside a morgue in Ankara, Turkey, after at least 28 people were killed and 61 were injured in a car bombing near a convoy of military vehicles in the capital on Wednesday: photo by Chris McGrath via the New York Times, 18 February 2016

 
Traders, brokers and clerks shout and gesture on the trading floor of the open outcry pit at the London Metal Exchange (LME), at their new premises on Finsbury Square in London: photo by Chris Ratcliffe/Bloombergs, 18 February 2016

 

People surrounded by smoke wave flags and shout slogans during a protest by a Spanish taxi drivers’€™ union in Madrid: photo by Francisco Seco/AP, 18 February 2016

An H-2A rocket carrying the ASTRO-H satellite, developed in collaboration between the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), NASA and other groups, lifts off at the Tanegashima Space Center in Kagoshima Prefecture, southwestern Japan: photo by Jiji Press/AFP, 17 February 2016

Former French President Nicolas Sarkozy (C) arrives at the Pole Financier (the financial section of Paris court house) in the French capital, to be heard in the investigation of false invoices in the “Bygmalion affair”, a corruption scandal centred on claims that his party paid some of his campaign expenses in 2012 to get around strict spending limits: photo by Thomas Samson/AFP, 16 February 2016

Kashmiri fisherman on Dal Lake in Srinagar, the summer capital of Indian-administered  Kashmir. The temperature in the Kashmir valley has risen and people are out enjoying the warmer weather: photo by Farooq Khan/EPA, 18 February 2016

Chinese men pull a tricycle in a neighborhood next to a coal-fired power plant in Shanxi, China, November 26, 2015. Daily Life, 1st prize singles, World Press Photo Awards (Kevin Frayer – China’s Coal Addiction) .: photo by Kevin Frayer via WPP/Reuters, 18 February 2016

Model feebee poses as part of art installation i€œDazzle roomi€ made by artist Shigeki Matsuyama at Room 32 fashion and design exhibition in Tokyo, on Friday: photo byShuji Kajiyama/AP, 19 February 2016

Migrants crowded an inflatable boat that landed at Mytilene, Greece, on the island of Lesvos, after crossing the Aegean Sea from Turkey: photo by Aris Messinis/Agence France-Presse, 17 February 2015

 

Volunteers of an NGO direct refugees and migrants arriving in a dinghy from Turkey to the coast of Mytilini, on the island of Lesvos, Greece: photo by Orestis Panagiotou/EPA, 17 February 2016


Senator Marco Rubio of Florida, a Republican candidate for president, giving a speech in Greenville, S.C. The Republican primary is Saturday: photo by Alex Wong via the New York Times, 18 February 2016  

The 2016 presidential campaign will be remembered as the least rational in recent memory: image via Reuters Opinion @Reuters Opinion, 17 February 2016

Muhammed (L), 13, of Syria and Mahdi Ghafour, 6, of Afghanistan plays on a pier on in Kladesholmen, Sweden. Last year Sweden received 162,877 asylum applications, more than any European country proportionate to its population. According to the Swedish Migration Agency, Sweden housed more than 180,000 people in 2015, more than double the total in 2014. The country is struggling to house refugees in proper conditions during the harsh winter; summer holiday resorts, old schools and private buildings are being turned into temporary shelters for asylum seekers as they wait for a decision on their asylum application. Sweden is facing new challenges on its migration policy after the massive arrival of refugees last year, forcing the country to drastically reduce the number of refugees passing through its borders. Stricter controls have had a significant effect on the number of arrivals, reducing weekly numbers from 10,000 to 800. The Swedish migration minister announced in January that the government will reject up to 80,000 refugees who applied for asylum last year, proposing strict new residency rules: photo by David Ramos via FT Photo Diary, 16 February 2016

NO ONE EXPRESSES THE HUMAN CONDITION BETTER THAN A BABY SEA LION STRANDED IN A HUMAN ENVIRONMENT: image via Julia Carrie Wong @juliacarriew, 4 February 2016

Broken Boats / Bertolt Brecht: In Times of Extreme Persecution

February 21, 2016, 10:33 pm

≫ Next: Mahmoud Darwish: Psalm 9 ("O rose beyond the reach of time and of the senses") / Stop Paying for Ethnic Cleansing and Send Your Kids To College For Free: A Modest Billboard Proposal

≪ Previous: Walter de La Mare: Napoleon: ideological ascendancy in the least rational campaign in recent memory

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#UPDATE: Twin car bombs kill at least 46 in Syria's Homs as truce efforts flounder #Homs: image via AFP news agency @AFP, 21 February 2016

Bertolt Brecht: In Times of Extreme Persecution

Once you’ve been beaten
What will remain?
Hunger and sleet and
Driving rain.

Who’ll point the lesson?
Just as of old
Hunger and cold
Will point the lesson.

Won’t people say then
It could never have worked?
The heaviest laden
Will wish they had shirked.

What will remind them
Of all the killed?
Wounds still unhealed
Those will remind them.

Bertolt Brecht (1898-1956): In den Zeiten der äussersten Verfolgung, 1940, translated by John Willett as In Times of Extreme Persecution, in Bertolt Brecht: Poems 1913-1956, ed. John Willett and Ralph Manheim with the co-operation of Erich Fried, 1976

 #MigrantCrisis.Europe has 'completely failed' in migrant crisis: UN refugee chief I Photo @ArisMessinis #AFP: image via Stephanie Beauge @sbeaugeAFP, 19 February 2016

 

#France: A man flies a kite at the "Jungle" refugee camp in #Calais: image via Talar Kalajian @TalarKala, 20 February 2016

 

 #migrants and refugees arrive at the port of Mytilene on Lesbos #Greece #AFP Photo by @ArisMessinis: image via Aurelia BAILLY @AureliaBAILLY, 19 February 2016

 #migrants and refugees arrive at the port of Mytilene on Lesbos #Greece #AFP Photo by @ArisMessinis: image via Aurelia BAILLY @AureliaBAILLY, 19 February 2016

 #migrants and refugees arrive at the port of Mytilene on Lesbos #Greece #AFP Photo by @ArisMessinis: image via Aurelia BAILLY @AureliaBAILLY, 19 February 2016

 #migrants and refugees arrive at the port of Mytilene on Lesbos #Greece #AFP Photo by @ArisMessinis: image via Aurelia BAILLY @AureliaBAILLY, 19 February 2016

#Lesbos #refugees: image via Aris Messinis @ArisMessinis, 20 February 2016

 

#Lesbos. #Refugees and migrants: image via Aris Messinis @ArisMessinis, 19 February 2016

#Lesbos. #Refugees and migrants: image via Aris Messinis @ArisMessinis, 19 February 2016

#Lesbos. #Refugees and migrants: image via Aris Messinis @ArisMessinis, 19 February 2016

#Lesbos. #Refugees and migrants: image via Aris Messinis @ArisMessinis, 19 February 2016

 #Refugees and migrants. #Lesbos.: image via Aris Messinis @ArisMessinis, 19 February 2016

 #Refugees and migrants. #Lesbos.: image via Aris Messinis @ArisMessinis, 19 February 2016

 #Refugees and migrants arrive at the port of #Lesbos: image via Aris Messinis @ArisMessinis, 18 February 2016

 #Refugees and migrants arrive at the port of #Lesbos: image via Aris Messinis @ArisMessinis, 18 February 2016

 #Refugees and migrants arrive at the port of #Lesbos: image via Aris Messinis @ArisMessinis, 18 February 2016

 #Refugees and migrants arrive at the port of #Lesbos: image via Aris Messinis @ArisMessinis, 18 February 2016

 #MigrantCrisis.Europe has 'completely failed' in migrant crisis: UN refugee chief I Photo @ArisMessinis #AFP: image via Stephanie Beauge @sbeaugeAFP, 19 February 2016

 #Refugees and migrants.#Lesbos. Many didn't make it. Many more still missing.: image via Aris Messinis @ArisMessinis, 17 February 2016

 #MigrantCrisis.Europe has 'completely failed' in migrant crisis: UN refugee chief I Photo @ArisMessinis #AFP: image via Stephanie Beauge @sbeaugeAFP, 19 February 2016

Migrants wait for permission to cross the border from Macedonia to Serbia near Tabanovce. By @RAtanasovski #AFP: image via Stephanie Beauge @sbeaugeAFP, 21 February 2016

Migrants wait for permission to cross the border from Macedonia to Serbia near Tabanovce. By @RAtanasovski #AFP: image via Stephanie Beauge @sbeaugeAFP, 21 February 2016

Migrants wait for permission to cross the border from Macedonia to Serbia near Tabanovce. By @RAtanasovski #AFP: image via Stephanie Beauge @sbeaugeAFP, 21 February 2016

Migrants wait for permission to cross the border from Macedonia to Serbia near Tabanovce. By @RAtanasovski #AFP: image via Stephanie Beauge @sbeaugeAFP, 21 February 2016
.

Human / sea lion encounter: image via Julia Carrie Wong @juliacarriew, 20 February 2016

 

 #Diaenimagenes @RAtanasovski #AFP: image via Agence France-Presse @ AFPespanol, 4 February 2016

 #migrants and refugees walk to cross the Macedonia-Serbia border near Tabanovce. #AFP Photo by @RAtanasovski: image via Aurelia BAILLY @AureliaBAILLY, 5 February 2016

Pattuglia cinofila della polizia ceca "antimigranti" in trasferta a Gevgelija, dove Macedonia e Grecia confinano #AFP: image via 24zampe 24@zampe, 8 February 2016

 

#MACEDONIA: A man & a woman help a child board a train as refugees prepare to travel to Serbia by @RAtanasovski: image via Talar Kalajian @TalarKala, 19 February 2016

Меѓу 20 светски фотографи неделава е @RAtanasovski. Респект Роко! Прауд :-) e [Gevgelija, Macedonia. Refugees board a train heading to Serbia from the Macedonian-Greek border.]: image via Jane Doe @sonjatd, 20 February 2016

 #refugees and #migrants in the port of Piraeus #Greece this morning: image via louisa gouliamaki @lgouliam, 18 February 2016  Paris, France

 

 #refugees and #migrants in the port of Piraeus #Greece this morning: image via louisa gouliamaki @lgouliam, 18 February 2016  Paris, France

An elderly refugee waits to board a bus to Greek-Macedonian border after his arrival in Athens. By @lgouiam #AFP: image via AFP Photo Department @AFPphoto, 18 February 2016

#Refugee children arrive in the port of #Piraeus from the island of #Lesbos #Greece photo @lgouliam @AFPphoto: image via Sunday Times Pictures @STPictures, 15 February 2016

 

#UPDATE: Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni wins fifth term: election commission #Uganda: image via AFP news agency @AFP, 20 February 2016

Despite the defeat supporters of Uganda opposition leader Besigye cheer for him in Kampala @AFPphoto @CarldeSouza1: image via AFP Photo Department @AFPphoto, 20 February 2016


Caucusgoers at Cheyenne High School in North Las Vegas: photo by Isaac Brekken for The New York Times, 20 February 2016

Hillary Clinton took a selfie with an employee as she visited workers at the Paris Hotel in Las Vegas on Thursday: photo by Ruth Fremson/The New York Times, 18 February 2016

Clinton won't release transcripts of paid speeches until other candidates do: image via Reuters Top News @Reuters, 20 February 2016

BREAKING: Hillary Clinton projected winner in Nevada caucus: Fox News #NVDemsCaucus: image via Reuters Politics @ReutersPolitics, 20 February 2016

VIDEO: "Thank you, Nevada" -- Clinton: image via Reuters Top News @Reuters, 20 February 2016

Hillary Clinton at a rally in Las Vegas on Friday: photo by Ruth Fremson/The New York Times, 20 February 2016

Senator Bernie Sanders spoke at the Faith Leaders Prayer Breakfast at Allen University in Columbia, S.C., on Monday: photo by Eric Thayer for The New York Times, 15 February 2016

Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont speaking to supporters in Henderson, Nevada, after the caucuses.: photo byJim Young/Reuters, 20 February 2016


Bernie Sanders: photo by Jae C. Hong/Associated Press, 21 February 2016
 

 

At a campaign event for Marco Rubio in Aiken, S.C., on Wednesday: photo by Eric Thayer for The New York Times, 17 February 2016

Jeb Bush spoke to reporters on Thursday after a town hall event at the Columbia Tourism and Lodging Association in Columbia, S.C.: photo by Gabriella Demczuk for The New York Times, 18 February 2016
 

 
Jeb Bush with his mother, Barbara, in Spartanburg: photo by Gabriella Demczuk for The New York Times, 19 February 2016

Jan Patterson, centre left, hugs her friend Joni Scotter before the start of a town hall meeting with Republican presidential candidate, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, in Coralville, Iowa: photo by Jae C. Hong/AP, 12 January 2016

After a town hall event with Jeb Bush at the Laurel Creek Club in Rock Hill, S.C., on Thursday..: photo by Gabriella Demczuk for The New York Times, 18 February 2016

 #Kosovo Policemen wearing gas masks inspect the parliament #AFP Photo by @armendnimani: image via Aurelia BAILLY @AureliaBAILLY, 19 February 2016

Mahmoud Darwish: Psalm 9 ("O rose beyond the reach of time and of the senses") / Stop Paying for Ethnic Cleansing and Send Your Kids To College For Free: A Modest Billboard Proposal

February 22, 2016, 8:21 pm

≫ Next: Robert Creeley: Was

≪ Previous: Broken Boats / Bertolt Brecht: In Times of Extreme Persecution

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Occupation, Colonialism and Apartheid in Israel – A Photo Essay by Mats Svensson#Palestine #EndTheOccupation: image via free falling upwards @philipgeany, 17 February 2016

Mahmoud Darwish: Psalm 9

O rose beyond the reach of time and of the senses

O kiss enveloped in the scarves of all the winds

surprise me with one dream

then my madness will recoil from you

Recoiling from you

in order to approach you

I discovered time

Approaching you

in order to recoil from you

I discovered my senses

Between approach and recoil

there is a stone the size of a dream

It does not approach

It does not recoil

You are my country

A stone is not what I am

therefore I do not like to face the sky

nor do I lie level with the ground

but am a stranger, always a stranger

 

Mahmoud Darwish (1942-2008): Psalm 9, translated from the Arabic by Lena Khadra Jayyusi and Christopher Middleton in Modern Arabic Poetry: An Anthology, ed. Lena Khadra Jayussi, 1987

 

Occupation, Colonialism and Apartheid in Israel – A Photo Essay by Mats Svensson #Palestine #EndTheOccupation: image via free falling upwards @philipgeany, 17 February 2016

Billboard along heavily traveled I-680 in Walnut Creek, California, seen on 18 February 2016. If Americans Knew, a California-based group, paid $5,000 for a 30-day rental of the billboard.Journalist and author Alison Weir, of Richmond, California, speaking on behalf of the group in Walnut Creek on 9 February, said billboards like Walnut Creek's have appeared in almost 30 states, and that new ones are coming to Connecticut, New York, Texas and Florida. American taxpayers give Israel $3.1 billion per year in direct military aid, and routinely provide millions more each year for missile defense programs. (For fiscal year 2015, Congress gave Israel an additional $619.8 million, making total military aid to Israel $3.7 billion, or $10.2 million per day.) Palestinians do not receive military aid. Late Sunday, after the "$10 million a day" billboard comes down, another will go up at the same spot in Walnut Creek, sponsored by Los Angeles-based pro-Israeli group StandWithUs. Its graphic design will be similar, but its message will quite different. StandWithUs has used this direct-replacement strategy in other cities.: photo by Jose Carlos Fajardo/Bay Area News Group via Contra Costa Times, 22 February 2016

U.S. aid to Israel prevents peace: The United States' massive spending on Israel hurts Americans: Alison Weir, Orlando Sentinel, 9 February 2016

In Eli Ziegler's New Voices column, "An anti-Israel billboard campaign sends dark message to Orlandoans," in Thursday's Sentinel, an Israel partisan dutifully defends Israel.

He repeats talking points developed by Israel's billion-dollar advocacy machine, including the usual accusation that critics are supposedly "bigoted."

Let us examine the facts:

Thanks to the powerful Israel lobby, politicians from both parties have sent tiny Israel more of our tax money than they've sent to any other country -- on average 7,000 times more per capita than to others around the world. Today this is $3.7 billion per year (more than $10 million per day).

In a unique arrangement, Israel gets almost all this money in a lump sum at the beginning of the year. Since the U.S. is operating at a deficit, this means that we borrow this money, give it to Israel and then pay interest long after it's gone. Israel deposits this in an interest-bearing account, making even more money off the U.S. economy.

Alison Weir, executive director of If Americans Knew and president of the Council for the National Interest, speaking in March 2015 at the National Summit to Reassess the US-Israel 'special relationship': image via If Americans Knew 

And this is just the tip of the iceberg.

Added to this disbursement is $1.45 billion annually to Egypt and $1.5 billion to Jordan, thanks to deals concocted by Israel in which American tax money would be used to buy off opposition to Israel's ethnic cleansing of the non-Jews who originally inhabited the land it wished for a Jewish-only state.

On top of this is the more than $2 trillion cost of the Iraq war, which was engineered by Israel partisans in the administration and enabled by others in the national media, such as Judith Miller, formerly of The New York Times. Impossible to quantify in dollars are the thousands of American and Iraqi lives destroyed through this disastrous invasion.

In addition to these costs is the humanitarian aid for Palestinians who have been displaced, whose property has been stolen, and whose deaths and injuries are caused by Israeli invasions. Additional aid is given to the Palestinian authority to round up resistance fighters on behalf of Israel. This totals about $700 million per year.

In addition to the deep financial burden these disbursements impose on Americans, our money enables Israeli violence and aggression that causes continuing instability and tragedy throughout the Middle East. This prevents peace, endangers Americans, and is a continual cause of misery.

It also gives Israeli militarists the belief that since Israel has the most powerful nation in today's world in its back pocket, there is no need to compromise with Palestinians. Only when Americans change this dynamic will true peace negotiations be conducted and peace eventually forged.

News coverage of our Orlando billboard. Donate to help put up more!: image via If Americans Knew @ifamericansknew, 28 January 2016

Question for the pro #Israel people. What do you expect the people of #Palestine to do? What options do they have?: image via Robert Martin @Robert_Martin72, 19 February 2016

!!!Boycotting Israeli goods will be illegal for public bodies and student unions in the UK #Palestine #BDS: image via free falling upwards @philipgeany, 15 February 2016

Wow !! These posters are on the London Underground !! That's one way of raising issues. #Palestine: image via ravinder singh @RaviSinghKA, 22 February 2016

Roger Waters: 'I have been accused of being a Nazi and an anti-Semite': photo via The Independent, 19 February 2016

Roger Waters: Pink Floyd star on why his fellow musicians are terrified to speak out against Israel: Exclusive: 'If they say something they will no longer have a career – I have been accused of being a Nazi and an anti-Semite': Paul Gallagher, The Independent,  19 February 2016 American musicians who support boycotting Israel over the issue of Palestinian rights are terrified to speak out for fear their careers will be destroyed, according to Roger Waters. The Pink Floyd star -- a prominent supporter of the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israel since its inception 10 years ago -- said the experience of seeing him constantly labelled a Nazi and anti-Semite had scared people into silence. “The only response to BDS is that it is anti-Semitic,” Waters told The Independent, in his first major UK interview about his commitment to Israeli activism. “I know this because I have been accused of being a Nazi and an anti-Semite for the past 10 years. “My industry has been particularly recalcitrant in even raising a voice [against Israel]. There’s me and Elvis Costello, Brian Eno, Manic Street Preachers, one or two others, but there’s nobody in the United States where I live. I’ve talked to a lot of them, and they are scared s***less. “If they say something in public they will no longer have a career. They will be destroyed. I’m hoping to encourage some of them to stop being frightened and to stand up and be counted, because we need them. We need them desperately in this conversation in the same way we needed musicians to join protesters over Vietnam.” Waters likened Israeli treatment of Palestinians to apartheid South Africa. “The way apartheid South Africa treated its black population, pretending they had some kind of autonomy, was a lie,” he said.  “Just as it is a lie now that there is any possibility under the current status quo of Palestinians achieving self-determination and achieving, at least, a rule of law where they can live and raise their children and start their own industries. This is an ancient, brilliant, artistic and very humane civilisation that is being destroyed in front of our eyes.” A trip to Israel in 2006, where Waters had planned to play a gig in Tel Aviv and the end of the European leg of his Dark Side of the Moon Live tour, transformed his view of the Middle East.

Roger Waters of Pink Floyd alludes to his band’s lyrics while painting on the Israeli-Palestinian security barrier in Bethlehem in 2006: photo via The Independent. 19 February 2016

 

The key passed from father to son, up to the door from which it was wrenched... #RightOfReturn #Palestine: image via RosmeWarda_Palestine @RosmeWarda, 22 February 2016

Last night at a climate change event in New York City, Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders once again found himself in the crosshairs over his inconsistent -- Israeli exempt -- opposition to U.S. entanglement in the Middle East.  Sanders was interrupted by two protestors, while he addressed the panel on “The Climate Crisis: Which Way Out?”  The protesters held a sign for the audience, which read “BERNIE VOTED FOR THE WAR ON THE INDIGENOUS PEOPLE OF PALESTINE.”.: photo via Addicting Info, 21 September 2014

Senator Bernie Sanders speaks at Liberty University: photo by Steve Helber/AP, 19 January 2016

David Cameron is welcomed by the speaker of the Knesset Yuli-Yoel Edelstein during his visit to Israel in March 2015. The British Inter-Parliamentary Union has invited Edelstein -- who lives on an illegal Israeli settlement built on Palestinian land, publically opposes Palestinian statehood and supports initiatives to colonize what is left of Palestinian land (e.g. Lobby for Greater Israel) -- to address both Houses of Parliament on 2 March. In a recent interview, the British Ambassador to Israel David Quarrey said that "the relationship between Britain and Israel…is probably stronger and deeper than it has ever been". The current British government has done everything to protect and enhance its ties with Israel, even trying to squash all dissent at home, and is undermining British democracy by restricting the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israeli products and institutions complicit with the occupation. In his speech to the Knesset during a state visit in 2014, David Cameron said he was proud that Britain played a major part in creating Israel. Is he also proud of Britain’s policies towards the Palestinians?: photo by Israel Sun/REX Shutterstock via The Independent, 22 February 2016

Hillary Clinton greets a supporter following her address at the 18th Annual David N. Dinkins Leadership and Public Policy Forum at Columbia University in New York: photo by Brendan McDermid/Reuters via the Guardian, 29 April 2015

Hillary Clinton greets a supporter following her address at the 18th Annual David N. Dinkins Leadership and Public Policy Forum at Columbia University in New York: photo by Brendan McDermid/Reuters via the Guardian, 29 April 2015

Then secretary of state Hillary Clinton meets with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during the 67th United Nations General Assembly in New York, 27 September 2012: photo by Avi Ohayon/GPO/Flash90  via Times of Israel, 30 March 2015

 

Hard day of diplomacy ... Benjamin Netanyahu and Hillary Clinton during a news conference in Jerusalem on Saturday: photo by Rina Castelnuovo / AP via Sydney Morning Herald, 2 November 2009

 

In this handout photo provided by the GPO, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu meets with U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on July 16, 2012 in Jerusalem, Israel: photographer unknown via Zimbio, July 2014

United States Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speak before a meeting at the Regency hotel, Thursday, September 27, 2012 in New York: photo by John Minichillo / AP, 27 September 2012

 

Hillary Rodham Clinton at the Western Wall in Jerusalem in 2005. After awkward episodes as first lady, she proved to be Israel’s friend as senator: photo by Rina Castelnuovo for The New York Times, 1 January 2009

Israeli President Shimon Peres (R) and US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton speak after a joint press conference on July 16, 2012 in Jerusalem, Israel. Clinton is in Israel to discuss diplomacy with Iran, Syria and Egypt in addition to peace talks regarding the Middle East: photo by Lior Mizrahi via Zimbio, 16 July 2012

 

In this handout provided by U.S. Embassy Tel Aviv, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton meets with Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (R) on November 21, 2012 in Jerusalem: photographer unknown via Zimbio, July 2014

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton meeting at a peace summit in Sharm el-Sheikh: photo by AP, 14 September 2010

Apartheid is back. Apartheid is a tangible, unmistakable realty in Palestine as it was in South Africa. Many were fooled to think that Apartheid was buried forever, that Colonialism was only meant for the history books. Now that we know we must take a stand and dare speak out.: photo by Mat Svensson via The Palestine Chronicle, 10 February 2016


Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel arriving at the Great Synagogue in Jerusalem for the Purim holiday last week: photo by Uriel Sinai for The New York Times, 10 March 2015

Robert Creeley: Was

February 23, 2016, 7:48 pm

≫ Next: Dumbo Rampant: Great Moments in the Rapidly Accelerating Devolution of Murica

≪ Previous: Mahmoud Darwish: Psalm 9 ("O rose beyond the reach of time and of the senses") / Stop Paying for Ethnic Cleansing and Send Your Kids To College For Free: A Modest Billboard Proposal

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Pascal Wehrlein of Germany, a Formula One racecar driver, drove during winter testing at Circuit de Catalunya in Montmeló, Spain: photo by Dan Istitene via The New York Times, 23 February 2016

 

Say Mr. Snowman can

play a song for me

 

yes you

 

 Robert Creeley (1927-2005): Was, from Places, 1990

 

Visitors made their way around the Mobile World Congress wireless show in Barcelona, Spain: photo by Manu Fernandez/Associated Press, 23 February 2016

A Palestinian child ran to take cover during an outdoor school lesson as rain fell in the West Bank city of Al-Azariya. The Israeli Army dismantled the prefab classrooms there.: photo by Ahmad Gharabli/Agence France-Presse, 23 February 2016
 

Emergency services personnel responded after a train derailed when it hit a hydraulic crane near Dalfsen, the Netherlands, killing one and injuring seven: photo by Bram Van De Biezen/Agence France-Presse, 23 February 2016
 

President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia attended a ceremony at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier by the Kremlin wall on Defender of the Fatherland Day in Moscow: photo by Natalia Kolesnikova/Agence France-Presse, 23 February 2016

Migrants near Idomeni, Greece, stood behind a fence at the Greek border with Macedonia, where they have been stranded by travel restrictions: photo by Marko Djurica/Reuters, 23 February 2016

Clothes belonging to migrants were left on a beach of Siculiana, Sicily. Two migrants drowned off the coast of Sicily, Italy’s coast guard said.: photo by Guglielmo Mangiapane/Reuters, 19 February 2016

A migrant waited to enter Macedonia from Greece near Gevgelija, Macedonia.  No word on whether he was allowed to enter.: photo by Ognen Teofilvovski/Reuters,19 February 2016

A model backstage with a creation from the 2nd Skin Company’s Fall/Winter 2016 collection during Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week in Madrid: photo by Susana Vera/Reuters, 22 February 2016

Buddhist monks prayed during Makha Bucha Day in Chiang Mai, Thailand, to honor Buddha and his teachings on the day of the full moon in the third lunar month: photo by Athit Perawongmetha/Reuters, 22 February 2016

Ultra-Orthodox Jews in Jerusalem mourned Rabbi Yochanan Sofer of the Erlau dynasty, a Holocaust survivor who died at age 93: photo by Ariel Schalit/Associated Press, 22 February 2016

 A sleeping Syrian child and a Syrian girl who had been begging on the streets of Istanbul: photo by Bulent Kilic/Agence France-Presse, 22 February 2016

A man walked by a sleeping Syrian child and a Syrian girl who had been begging on the streets of Istanbul: photo by Bulent Kilic/Agence France-Presse, 22 February 2016

 

Four Vietnamese fishing boats were destroyed by Indonesia’s navy in West Kalimantan, Indonesia, after their captains were accused of fishing illegally in Indonesian waters: photo by Antara Foto/Reuters, 22 February 2016

A young girl who arrived with other refugees and migrants in Mytilene, a port on the Greek island of Lesbos: photo by Aris Messinis/Agence France-Presse, 22 February 2016

 

Refugees and migrants waiting to be allowed to cross the Greek border into Macedonia slept next to shipping containers near the city of Polikastro, Greece: photo by Aris Alexandros Avramidis/Reuters, 22 February 2016

Refugees and migrants waiting to be allowed to cross the Greek border into Macedonia slept next to shipping containers near the city of Polikastro, Greece: photo by Aris Alexandros Avramidis/Reuters, 22 February 2016

A worker from the capital development authorities attaches a billboard to poles over a highway in Islamabad, Pakistan: photo by Anjum Naveed/AP, 23 February 2016

 

Russian President Vladimir Putin attends a wreath laying ceremony at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier by the Kremlin wall to mark the Defender of the Fatherland Day in Moscow: photo by Natalia Kolesnikov/AFP, 23 February 2016

 
Monir polishes a pot at an aluminium factory in Dhaka, Bangladesh: photo by Abir Abdullah/EPA, 23 February 2016

A full moon rises over the Statue of Liberty, seen from the Port Liberte neighborhood of Jersey City, N.J.: photo by Julio Cortez / AP, 23 February 2016

 

A group of students pose for a photograph as they tour the Naksan ‘art village’ wearing 1970′s style school uniforms as part of an educational initiative, in Seoul: photo by Ed Jones/AFP, 23 February 2016

Supporters of US Republican presidential candidate businessman Donald Trump at a rally in Las Vegas, Nevada: photo by Mike Nelson / EPA, 23 February 2016

 

Supporters of US Republican presidential candidate businessman Donald Trump at a rally in Las Vegas, Nevada: photo by Mike Nelson / EPA, 23 February 2016

 

Four of eight confiscated Vietnamese fishing boats are destroyed in Mempawah Regency, West Kalimantan, Indonesia. The Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries, together with the Indonesian Navy, destroyed 30 foreign fishing vessels in different locations across the country, which were seized earlier for illegal fishing in Indonesian waters.: photo by Reuters, 23 February 2016

A view beyond the observation tower of the Marina Bay Sands towards public and private residential apartment buildings in Singapore: photo by Edgar Su/Reuters, 22 February 2016

 
People look out from the observation tower of the Marina Bay Sands amongst public and private residential apartment buildings in Singapore: photo by Edgar Su/Reuters, 22 February 2016

 

Refugees from Afghanistan sit beside railway tracks near a transit center for refugees at the Macedonian-Serbian border in the northern Macedonian village of Tabanovce today. More than 600 Afghan refugees were stranded since Saturday at the transit centre while waiting for a permission to cross the border into Serbia. Serbia says the decision to block refugees from Afghanistan from passing through the so-called Balkan migrant corridor has been made by Austria and Slovenia: photo by Boris Grdanoski/AP, 22 February 2016

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Dumbo Rampant: Great Moments in the Rapidly Accelerating Devolution of Murica

February 24, 2016, 10:34 pm

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Attendees cheered after hearing the Nevada caucus results at Donald J. Trump’s watch party in Las Vegas on Tuesday night: photo by Ruth Fremson/The New York Times, 23 February 2016

The moment when everybody's happy because they're feeling free to hate with impunity

again, because hating's what makes

Murica great. That and the [ubiquitous] copious [redundant][accumulation of][superabundance of] kidney fat.

 

A veteran and protester holds up a sign at a Trump campaign event in Las Vegas on Monday. He was later ejected from the audience.: photo by  Ruth Fremson/The New York Times, 23 February 2016

The moment at which the herd of lard-ass dumbos becomes aware of an alien in its midst, aching

to be "roughed up"

because he's "nowheres near" fat and dumb enough to be a true [real bonafide] Murican

 

Donald Trump speaks to supporters in Las Vegas after his victory in the Nevada caucuses: photo by Jae C. Hong / Associated Press, 23 February 2016

Trump in Las Vegas. He has now won three states in a row in the GOP nominating contest.: photo by Jae C. Hong / Associated Press, 23 February 2016

Trump supporters at his Las Vegas rally celebrate his Nevada victory: photo by Jae C. Hong / Associated Press, 23 February 2016

 

Trump supporters in Las Vegas: photo by Jae C. Hong / Associated Press, 23 February 2016

Donald Trump greets supporters at a caucus site in Las Vegas: photo by Jae C. Hong / Associated Press, 23 February 2016

'A cauldron of the baser instincts of humanity': inside Donald Trump's Nevada triumph: Ideology is almost beside the point at the Republican caucus in Nevada. Dave Schilling reports on how personality and temperament are swaying voters in this insane, apocalyptic election: Dave Schilling, The Guardian, 24 February 2016

There is a moment during Donald Trump’s effusive, ebullient victory speech, following his huge victory in Nevada, when he asks fellow hotel magnate Steve Wynn to stand up. Trump and Wynn are both bombastic personalities with a penchant for self-mythologizing. Trump says that he constantly reminds Wynn that the Trump International Hotel is the best in Las Vegas. On this one assertion, I cannot quibble with The Donald, having spent the past 48 hours staying there. Trump’s hotel doesn’t have a casino. You can’t smoke inside either. The ostentatious decor suits the man whose name adorns practically every inch of the 50-floor tower on Fashion Show Drive. It is all marble and gold, with crystal chandeliers and wood paneling. The whole place reeks of what I can only describe as a curious mix of embalming fluid and baby powder. It is, in short, a monument to all that is tacky and grandiose about America.

#realDonaldTrump will speak here tonight. Unclear when we'll know a winner of the#Nevadacaucus, though: image via Emily Cahn @CahnEmily, 23 February 2016

The hotel’s faux-chic styling is in stark contrast to the supporters, who stand in interminable queues for the opportunity to get a glimpse of their burnt-orange hero at Donald Trump’s pre-caucus rally on Monday. 

This line snakes far from the entrance and is only getting longer at Palo Verde HS. #Nevadacaucus: image via Emily Cahn @CahnEmily, 23 February 2016

The rally takes place in a quaint venue called the South Point Arena, an event space adjacent to a casino in Enterprise, Nevada, an area known as horse country that mostly caters to the rodeo crowd. Oversized photos of men in cowboy hats, and ads for fertilizer adorn the walls. The concession stands sell nachos, hot dogs, and flat soda pop.

The line to enter the caucus site here in Summerlin is LOOOOONG at 5 pm, when things begin.#Nevadacaucus: image via Emily Cahn @CahnEmily, 23 February 2016

A tractor with an American flag draped over it is near the stage from which Trump says he would like to punch a protester in the face as the man is escorted out of the building.

 


Trump at the Las Vegas rally.: photo by MediaPunch/Rex/Shutterstock, 23 February 2016 

 

It is worlds away from the overwhelming grandeur with which he typically associates himself, as memorialized by his Fashion Show Drive hotel. The Trump brand seems more than a little confused. Is he the populist hero giving voice to the blue-collar folks who feel lost in Barack Obama’s America? Or is he the man with a private jet and an overpriced collection of handbags on sale in the lobby of his hotel?

  

Dude in a robe waits for #realDonaldTrump in the lobby. That's #dedication #nevadacaucus: image via Emily Cahn @CahnEmily, 23 February 2016

It doesn’t seem to matter to his supporters that Trump represents all the worst excesses of cheesy, heartless capitalism. It certainly doesn’t matter that, on his arrival before the opening of voting in Nevada on Tuesday –- a state he later wins with a resounding victory -– a group of activists from the Culinary Workers Union protest in front of the hotel over Trump’s unwillingness to negotiate with employees who recently voted to unionize. It’s all meaningless to Trump supporters, in no small part because they have banded together against a common enemy: the media.  

The Culinary Workers Union stages a protest outside Trump International Hotel: photo by Mike Nelson/EPA, 23 February 2016

Attending a Trump rally is a nervy thing for a journalist. Invariably, the Republican frontrunner will single out the cordoned-off media pen, pointing in our direction while declaring that we are mostly horrible people who are ruining the nation one word at a time. Apart from the incessant blaring out of Billy Joel’s Uptown Girl, diatribes against the media are the most common occurrences at Trump gatherings. They boo us in the pen. They boo Fox News host Megyn Kelly. “These are the most dishonest people, bad people,” Trump says. It’s taken as gospel that 80% of journalists are shrieking devil worshippers who want nothing more than to consume the souls of right-thinking individuals all over the country.

Overseen at the #realDonaldTrump caucus night party at the Treasure Island casino on the Las Vegas strip: image via Emily Cahn @CahnEmily, 23 February 2016

 

It is quite a feeling to be among a crowd of thousands who would gladly tear you to pieces, given the right circumstances.

Aaron Castro, former Army gunner, traveled from Winnemucca (160 miles out) to see Trump. 'He's the one for us.': image via Kurtis Lee @kurtisalee, 23 February 2016

As Trump so callously tells one of the hecklers being escorted out of the rally, in the old days, he would have been taken out on a stretcher. The greying, overwhelmingly white audience might not actually be able to beat me up due to their age, but the spectre of menace is almost as potent as the real thing. “There’s not even a woman here my own age,” 28-year-old Timmy Lally, a documentary film-maker from Los Angeles tells me. Lally, bizarrely, considers himself undecided, despite his own fearful impression of the crowd. “I see a stadium full of racists,” he says. He is even more dubious of Trump’s potential as a world leader. “If people tell you he can’t run a hotel, how can he run a country?”

Aaron Castro, former Army gunner, traveled from Winnemucca (160 miles out) to see Trump. 'He's the one for us.': image via Kurtis Lee @kurtisalee, 23 February 2016 

After a few hours of cowering in terror, I feel the need to unwind with a bit of classic Vegas entertainment. A Trump rally isn’t that much different from the average casino show. There is loud music, acrobatics (in the case of Trump, the rhetorical kind that make your head spin like a faulty amusement park ride), free-flowing alcohol, ponderous pomposity, and a towering crescendo that leaves you with a sense of either blissful euphoria or crippling depression. There are even people in costumes. I spot a man wearing an American revolution uniform, an off-duty Elvis impersonator, and Robert S Ensler, a working Donald Trump impersonator. Ensler was once a Dean Martin impersonator, but got too old for it and eventually hopped on to the Trump gravy train. I ask him if he has ever met Trump. “Four years ago, I saw him at a women’s Republican event. This is when he first was thinking about running for president. And he was very unpolitically correct, swore, gutter mouth. It was great. I loved it. Everyone went nuts for it. He saw me. He said: ‘I know you. You’re a good-looking guy.’”

Elvis and Trump impersonators greet Donald Trump in Las Vegas on Monday: photo by Ruth Fremson/New York Times/Redux / eyevine, 23 February 2016

 

Trump rallies, like Vegas itself, are a roiling cauldron of the baser instincts of humanity. Self-absorption, frustration, and unrequited yearning combine to create a circus of the desperate. I suppose the only difference between the Trump rally and the musical I see afterwards is that I don’t fear for my safety during Cirque du Soleil’s Michael Jackson ONE at the Mandalay Bay casino.

#MichaelJacksonONE is a dazzling  #CirqueduSoleil tribute to the Gloved One that's surprisingly heartfelt #Vegas: image via Ed Uyeshima @EdUyeshima, 20 February 2016  Paradise, NV

In ONE, four squeaky nerds learn the power of dance through their discovery of relics owned by Michael Jackson –- his single sparkly glove, a hat, shoes, and sunglasses. A jukebox revue of Jackson’s songs follows, accompanied by smoke machines, open flames, sparks, and ghastly video projections of the dead pop star. Throughout the show, the protagonists are accosted by fascistic paparazzi demons with cameras attached to their heads, who want nothing more than to steal the spirit of Jacko and, I guess, take pictures. After the protagonists triumph over the media through their spangled creativity and gratuitous crotch-grabbing, they are strapped into what resemble metal coffins and ascend to what I can only assume is heaven, or some other place where there are no journalists, like Malibu.

Just been to see #michaeljacksonone #michaeljacksononeonecirquedusoeilabsolutely bloody amazing!!!: image via Vegas Selfie @vegaselfie, 23 February 2016 

 

Even for the cost of a Vegas show ticket, I still can’t escape the disgust that meets the average journalist. Never mind that Jackson was accused of molesting numerous children or that Trump has no problem inciting violence at his rallies. The real villains here are the media, who want to talk about it in public. Going to Trump’s victory speech was not nearly as perilous as his rally, but that doesn’t mean I feel totally comfortable surrounded by people hyped up on lukewarm Budweiser and good cheer. Trump still finds the time to chastise the media for vilifying him and wishing for his electoral demise, lashing out at pundits who believe he is vulnerable if either Ted Cruz or Marco Rubio drops out. “If they could just take the other candidates and add ’em up,” he says mockingly above jeers from the adoring masses. Cruz people and Rubio people and everyone else will end up Trump supporters, he contends.

#realDonaldTrump is still here at Palo Verde HS greeting folks. Woman just said "I'm Hispanic and voting for you": image via Emily Cahn @CahnEmily, 23 February 2016

As he said at the previous night’s rally, reflecting on his victory in South Carolina, which followed his victory in New Hampshire, there is no one who doesn’t like him. “Actually, I won everything. I won short people, tall people. I won fat people, skinny people. I won highly educated, OK-educated, and practically-not-educated-at-all. I won the evangelicals big and I won the military.” We all love Trump, and Trump loves us, even the so-called “poorly educated”. He loves them too, as long as they keep voting for him in droves.

Gabriella, 6, is a smart biz woman, selling cookies here in long line at #Nevadacaucus. 300 boxes sold already! : image via Emily Cahn @CahnEmily, 23 February 2016

 

But scooping up his rivals’ supporters might not be as easy as Trump claims. I go to the Durango Hills Community Center YMCA for a Cruz rally the Monday before the caucus, to figure out what is keeping some Republicans from embracing the man who has wrested a lion’s share of the available delegates from his befuddled competitors.

High Stakes for Cruz in Nevada Caucuses: image via National Review @NRO, 23 February 2016

A crowd of 100 or so Cruz people fills the modest gymnasium, patiently sitting through preliminary speakers such as former Fox News host Glenn Beck. Beck’s remarks meander from declaring that Hillary Clinton should be running for “president of cell block six” to a bizarre story about George Washington’s reluctant participation in the constitutional convention that produced the American system of government we tolerate today. Beck holds up a book that he says “confused him for a long time”. That book –- not the Bible or a copy of the US constitution -– is what he claims to be Washington’s personal copy of Don Quixote, which he says was purchased after the ratification of the nation’s governing document. That book, Beck says, carries some sort of special meaning for him, a meaning that he never quite got around to revealing to us by the time he was ushered off in favor of Cruz.

@glennnbeck is here greeting caucus goers. People are excited to see him. #Nevadacaucus: image via Emily Cahn @CahnEmily, 23 February 2016  

 

The guest of honor’s speech is a combination of attacks on Trump and dorky aphorisms such as: “I don’t advise carrying money in your underwear” and “Pick up the phone and call your mom,” which might be useful information for a slothful college student. This is not the kind of soaring, inspiring material that catapults the average politician to power, nor is it the bellicose hectoring of his main rival. Still, what Cruz says inexplicably inspires some to action.

#realDonaldTrump shows up as @glennbeck speaks. Room goes wild!: image via Emily Cahn @CahnEmily, 23 February 2016

One 62-year-old Cruz supporter I meet at the YMCA, might find it difficult to toss her vote to Trump if her chosen candidate gives up his own personal quixotic journey. “He’s a narcissist. He’s had three wives and his wife [now] is a porno star.” It’s unfair to label Melania Trump a “porno star”, considering the sorts of actual porno one can consume on and around the Las Vegas Strip, but statements such as this are indicative of the animosity that many people on the Republican side feel toward Trump, even as he careens into their presidential nomination. Despite this, there are points of agreement that might give his campaign a bit of hope. “All of us hate the Muslims,” the woman says casually during our chat, as though this is an unassailable truth that I must agree with.

A supporter waits for Donald Trump to speak at Monday’s campaign rally.: photo by John Locher/AP, 23 February 2016

Ideology is almost beside the point with the people here in Nevada. Personality and temperament are what sway voters in this insane, apocalyptic election. Before Trump’s mortal enemy the media declare him the winner of the caucus, I speak to Tario Mills, a 19-year-old woman covered in tattoos. She came to the victory speech with her father. This is her first election and she is a firmly committed Trump voter. She wants to go into politics as a profession, but is concerned that her tattoos may make that difficult. “When Donald wants something, he’s going to fight for it. I need someone who’s going to fight for what I want too,” she says. When I ask which issue she cares about the most, she says LGBT rights. I mention that Trump’s not the most committed ally of the cause. “Hillary shifted in support of it. Maybe he will, too.” But what if he doesn’t? “Then he doesn’t do it, you know.” At this moment, I realise that there is a segment of the Trump base that doesn’t care what he says. They just trust him to be tough, like a surly father figure from whom you crave approval in between swats from a leather belt. “If I don’t agree with what he does, I’ll still love and support him.” 

Someone's screaming and calling Donald Trump "dad" on the Nevada caucus snapchat story: image via Hunter Schwar @hunterschwartz, 23 February 2016 

 

If it doesn’t matter what Trump believes, and if it doesn’t matter that he lives in a gold and marble palace while his employees earn less than a living wage, then he might just be unstoppable.

Trump on Rubio: 'He hasn't hit me. When he does, you'll see what happens.': image via Kurtis Lee @kurtisalee, 23 February 2016

 

Peak Trump will actually be what they call Mt. Rushmore after his second term: image via andrew kaczynski @BuzzFeedAndrew, 23 February 2016

 

'Sign spotted at Trump's Sparks, Nev, rally. Always amazed at how many ppl dress up like Trump at these rallies.: image via Kurtis Lee @kurtisalee, 23 February 2016

 

 

 Second woman says no one checked her ID. She was just handed a ballot. She says it's very scary. #Nevadacaucus: image via Emily Cahn @CahnEmily, 23 February 2016

 

 

Caucus chaos at Palo Verde HS in Summerlin NV #nvgopcaucus: image via Bill Clark @billclarkhotos, 23 February 2016

 

The check in tables. Volunteers look overwhelmed. #Nevadacaucus: image via Emily Cahn @CahnEmily, 23 February 2016

 

This is the line for booze at the @realDonaldTrump caucus night party: image via EmilyCahn@CahnEmily, 23 February 2016  Paradise, NV

 

Two guys from LA here waiting for @realDonaldTrump at the Trump hotel.: image via EmilyCahn @CahnEmily, 23 February 2016

  

 "I'm not even an American, and I'm here." Says woman from the UK: image via EmilyCahn@CahnEmily, 23 February 2016  Paradise, NV

Happy Monday!!! #murica: image via Tiffany Hayden @haydenntiff, 22 February 2016

Curzio Malaparte: On patriotic dictatorship and Hitler's reactionary character: fromLa tecnica della colpo di Stato, 1931

 

 

Adolf Hitler: photo by Heinrich Hoffmann, 1927 (Deutsches Bundesarchiv)

What would induce Hitler to give up his dangerous opportunism? Is he waiting for Parliament to get the National-Socialist revolution under its control? He is afraid of being outlawed. Hitler, a poor imitation of Mussolini, is not posing as a Sulla, a Caesar, a Cromwell, a Bonaparte or a Lenin when he claims to be the liberator of the Fatherland; but he poses as a defender of the law, a restorer of national tradition, and servant of the State. One should always beware of a dictator’s patriotism. The future of this sort of civic hero does not lend any brilliance to his revolutionary past. As Giolitti would say, “Hitler is a man with a great future behind him.” He has lost so many opportunities. He could have overthrown the State numberless times had he known how to take advantage of favorable circumstances. In spite of his eloquence, his electoral successes, his insurrectional army, in spite of the undeniable prestige of his name, and the legends which have been woven about him as an agitator, a man who sways crowds, a violent and unscrupulous conspirator; in spite of the passions he inspires in those who surround him and of his dangerous sway over the imagination and the spirit of adventure in German youth, Hitler is only a would-be leader. In Moscow I heard a Bolshevik, who was one of the most active instruments of Trotsky’s revolutionary tactics during the coup d’état of October 1917, pass this singular judgment upon Hitler: “He has all Kerenski’sgood and bad qualities and like Kerenski, he too is only a woman.”

Adolf Hitler: photographer unknown, 1937 (Deutsches Bundesarchiv)

Hitler’s intelligence is in point of fact profoundly feminine: his mind, his ambitions, even his will are not in the least virile. He is a weak man who takes shelter in violence, so that he may conceal his lack of energy, his unexpected failings, his morbid egoism, and his clumsy pride. A quality common to nearly all dictators and one which is characteristic of their manner of judging men in relation to events, is their jealousy. Dictatorship is not only a form of government, it is also the most complete form of jealousy in all its aspects: political, moral and intellectual. Like all dictators, Hitleris guided much more by his passions than by his mind. His attitude towards his oldest partisans, the shock-troops who followed him from the very beginning, who stood by him in adversity, who shared his humiliation, dangers and imprisonment, who have been his glory and his power, can only be explained by jealousy. This will astonish only those who are unaware of the true nature of dictators, i.e., their violent and timid psychology. Hitler is jealous of those who have helped him to become one of the foremost figures in German political life. He is afraid of their pride, their energy, and their fighting spirit -- that fearless, disinterested enthusiasm which turns Hitler’s shock-troops into a dangerous weapon of power. He exercises all his brutality to humble their pride, to crush their freedom of will, to obscure their individual merits and to transform his partisans into flunkeys stripped of all dignity. Like all dictators, Hitler loves only those whom he can despise. His ambition is to be able one day to debase and humble the whole German nation and to reduce it to a state of servitude, in the name of German liberty, glory and power.

Adolf Hitler: photographer unknown, 1938 (Deutsches Bundesarchiv)

There is something confused, equivocal, something morbidly sexual in Hitler’s opportunist tactics, in his aversion from revolutionary violence, and in his hatred of every form of individual freedom and dignity. In the history of nations, at moments of great misfortune, after wars, invasions, or famines, there is always one man who rises above the masses and enforces his will, his ambition and his bitterness; who “wreaks a woman-like revenge” upon the whole people, for all the freedom, power and happiness that has been lost. In the history of European countries it is Germany’s turn now: Hitler is the dictator, the “woman” Germany deserves. The feminine side of him explains Hitler’s success, his domination of the crowd and the enthusiasm he rouses in the youth of Germany. In the eyes of the common people Hitler is untainted, ascetic, a mystical interpreter of action, a kind of saint. It is not as a Catiline that he wins approval. “No story of a womanis coupled with his name,” say his biographers. One ought rather to say of dictators, in general, that no story of a man is coupled with their name.

Benito Mussolini with Adolf Hitler: photographer unknown, 25 October 1936

In every dictator’s life there are moments which reveal the cloudy, unhealthy and sexual depths of his power; these are the crises which reveal the wholly feminine side of his character. In the relations between a leader and his followers these crises most frequently take the form of revolts. When he is menaced with domination by those he once humiliated and enslaved, the dictator defends himself with flaming energy against the rebellion of his partisans: it is the woman in him that defends herself. Cromwell, Lenin and Mussolini have all known these moments. Cromwell did not hesitate to use fire and the sword to crush the revolt of the “levellers,” who stood for a kind of Seventeenth Century Communism in England. Lenin had no pity for the mutinous sailors at Kronstadt, Mussolini was harsh with the Florentine Black Shirts whose revolt lasted a year, up to the eve of the coup d’état. It is surprising that Hitler has not yet had to face widespread sedition among his shock-troops. The partial mutinies which have sprung up all over Germany in the ranks of Hitler’s battle squadrons are perhaps only the first symptoms of an inevitable clash. Opportunism in the course of a revolution is a crime that entails its own punishment. Unhappy the dictator who heads a revolutionary army but shrinks from the responsibility of a coup d’état. He may, thanks to tricks and compromise, be able to seize power by legal means, but dictatorships which arise out of a compromise are only semi-dictatorships. They do not last. It is revolutionary violence which legitimizes a dictatorship: the coup d’étatitself is its soundest foundation. It is perhaps Hitler’s plan to arrive at power by parliamentary compromise. All he can do, if he wants to forestall a revolt among his fighting squads, is to distract their attention from the capture of the State, and rivet their revolutionary zeal not on internal politics but on foreign affairs. Has not the problem of the eastern frontiers been, for some time, the main theme of Hitler’s eloquence? It is significant that Germany’s future may depend on a parliamentary compromise rather than on a coup d’état. A dictator who will not dare to seize power by revolutionary action never could intimidate Western Europe, which is ready to defend its freedom whatever the cost.

Parade of SA troops past Hitler, Nuremberg: photographer unknown, September 1935 (Deutsches Bundesarchiv)

Curzio Malaparte: from Hitler: A Would-Be Dictator, in The Technique of Coup d'Etat (La tecnica della colpo di Stato), 1931 (translated by Sylvia Saunders, 1932)

Say hello to my little friend #Murica #BTS: image via Pierson Fodé Verified account @PiersonFode, 24 February 2016

America: image via Jeb Bush @JebBush, 16 February 2016 

Democrat presidential candidate Hillary Clinton gestures during a commercial break at a CNN town hall televised event at the University of South Carolina School of Law, in Columbia: photo by Gerald Herbert/AP, 24 February 2016

Democrat presidential candidate Hillary Clinton gestures during a commercial break at a CNN town hall televised event at the University of South Carolina School of Law, in Columbia: photo by Gerald Herbert/AP, 24 February 2016

 

 
Attendees cheered after hearing the Nevada caucus results at Donald J. Trump’s watch party in Las Vegas on Tuesday night: photo by Ruth Fremson/The New York Times, 23 February 2016 

A fighter loyal to the Libyan government checks a damaged house in Benghazi: photo by Abdullah Doma/AFP, 24 February 2016

Keeping an eye on the ball in Jupiter

February 25, 2016, 9:29 pm

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A Palestinian man uses a rope to climb over a section of Israel’s controversial separation barrier that separates the West Bank city of al-Ram from east Jerusalem: photo by Thomas Coex/AFP, 25 February 2016

A Palestinian man uses a rope to climb over a section of Israel’s controversial separation barrier that separates the West Bank city of al-Ram from east Jerusalem: photo by Thomas Coex/AFP, 25 February 2016

Opposition party supporters keep warm by a fire as they gather in front of Kosovo’s government building in Pristina: photo by Armend Nimani/AFP, 25 February 2016

A woman stands among photos taken of human rights victims during martial law, displayed at an experiential museum inside a military camp in Manila: photo by Ted Aljibe/AFP,  25 February 2016

 

Ethan Hawke with Uma Thurman on the red carpet during arrivals at the 74th Academy Awards celebration at the Kodak Theater in Hollywood: photo by Monica Almeida/The New York Times, 24 March 2002

 

Health authorities with the help of the Cuban army fumigate against the Aedes aegypti mosquito to prevent the spread of zika, chikungunya and dengue in a street of Havana: photo by Yamil Lage/AFP, 24 February 2016

Members of the news media on the red carpet for the 86th annual Academy Awards ceremony as nominees and celebrities arrive: photo by Monica Almeida/The New York Times. 2 March 2014

Bags of garbage sit in Jdeideh, a suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, where the city’s landfill was closed in July. Politicians have bickered about what to do with the trash ever since.: photo byJoseph Eid/Agence France-Presse, 25 February 2016

 

Bags of garbage sit in Jdeideh, a suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, where the city’s landfill was closed in July. Politicians have bickered about what to do with the trash ever since.: photo byJoseph Eid/Agence France-Presse, 25 February 2016

Keeping an eye on the ball in Jupiter

Human life as an experiential

museum inside a military camp to control the spread of human life

Is the only hope

 as it goes up into a doubtful sky

the return of the bags of garbage hidden inside the clothing of the stars?

Ichiro Suzuki, of the Miami Marlins, keeps his eye on a ball after tossing it in the air at spring training in Jupiter, Florida: photo by Jeff Roberson/Associated Press, 24 February 2016


 
Ichiro Suzuki, of the Miami Marlins, keeps his eye on a ball after tossing it in the air at spring training in Jupiter, Florida: photo by Jeff Roberson/Associated Press, 24 February 2016 

Sandra Bullock and George Clooney before the start of the 84th Academy Awards show: photo by Monica Almeida/The New York Times, 22 February 2012

 

A cold, rainy and blustery day in Times Square, New York: photo by Todd Heisler/The New York Times 24 February 2016

 

A boy walks in the old market in Damascus: photo by Hassan Ammar/Associated Press, 24 February 2016



A boy walks in the old market in Damascus: photo by Hassan Ammar/Associated Press, 24 February 2016

An aerial view of the debris from the Didcot Power Station in Oxfordshire, England after it collapsed, killing one and injuring five: photo by Steve Parsons/Press Association, via Associated Press, 24 February 2016

An aerial view of the debris from the Didcot Power Station in Oxfordshire, England after it collapsed, killing one and injuring five: photo by Steve Parsons/Press Association, via Associated Press, 24 February 2016
 

A migrant near the Macedonia-Greece border in Gevgelija, Macedonia.  Austria and nine Balkan states have agreed on measures to stop the flow of migrants from Greece.: photo by Marko Djurica/Reuters, 24 February 2016

A migrant near the Macedonia-Greece border in Gevgelija, Macedonia.  Austria and nine Balkan states have agreed on measures to stop the flow of migrants from Greece.: photo by Marko Djurica/Reuters, 24 February 2016

Asylum seekers from Iraq warm themselves as they wait to cross into Macedonia near Idomeni, Greece. About 12,000 migrants are stranded in Greece, the Interior Ministry said.: photo by Petros Giannakouris/Associated Press, 24 February 2016
 

Models for Gucci wait backstage at a fashion show in Milan: photo by Valerio Mezzanotti for The New York Times, 24 February 2016
 

A model wears clothing by Anteprima on the runway at a fashion show in Milan.: photo by Tiziana Fabi/Agence France-Presse, 25 February 2016

 

Former President Bill Clinton campaigns for his wife, Hillary, in Rock Hill, S.C. The Democratic primary is on Saturday in South Carolina.: photo by Sam Hodgson for The New York Times, 25 February 2016

 

A man rests on a blanket near railway tracks in Tabanovce, Macedonia, as he waits for permission to cross the border to Serbia: photo byBoris Grdanoski/Associated Press, 25 February 2016

 

A young refugee at the Piraeus port in Athens, where she will stay until she can be moved to a reception center: photo bySimela Pantzartzi/European Pressphoto Agency, 25 February 2016

Israeii border police stop and frisk a Palestinian youth next to the Damascus Gate of the Old City of Jerusalem: photo byAtef Safadi/European Pressphoto Agency, 25 February 2016

 
Israeii border police stop and frisk a Palestinian youth next to the Damascus Gate of the Old City of Jerusalem: photo byAtef Safadi/European Pressphoto Agency, 25 February 2016

 

Police in Manila try to stop Filipinos headed for the E.D.S.A. shrine commemorating the bloodless revolt that toppled the dictator Ferdinand Marcos in 1986: photo by Noel Celis/Agence France-Presse, 25 February 2016

 

 

 

Police in Manila try to stop Filipinos headed for the E.D.S.A. shrine commemorating the bloodless revolt that toppled the dictator Ferdinand Marcos in 1986: photo by Noel Celis/Agence France-Presse, 25 February 2016

Friedrich Hölderlin: Menschenbeifall / The Approval of Men

February 26, 2016, 9:36 pm

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Chris Christie endorses Donald Trump for president on Friday in Fort Worth, Texas: photo by Mike Stone/Reuters, 26 February 2016 

Friedrich Hölderlin: Menschenbeifall

Ist nicht heilig mein Herz, schöneren Lebens voll,
..Seit ich liebe? warum achtetet ihr mich mehr,
....Da ich stolzer und wilder,
......Wortereicher und leerer war?

Ach! der Menge gefällt, was auf den Marktplatz taugt,
..Und es ehret der Knecht nur den Gewaltsamen;
....An das Göttliche glauben
......Die allein, die es selber sind.

 

Chris Christie endorses Donald Trump for president on Friday in Fort Worth, Texas: photo by Mike Stone/Reuters, 26 February 2016 

Friedrich Hölderlin: The Approval of Men

Isn't my heart holy, filled with a whole
new more beautiful life, now that I've known love? Why did you value
me more highly then, when I was so full of myself
and my words were so much more numerous, and empty?

Ah, everybody rushes to approve
what sells; everybody wants to be told what to do by the powerful; and only those 
who have retained inhuman qualities continue to believe in anything
but what is human.

Friedrich Hölderlin (1770-1843): Menschenbeifall (The Approval of Men); German text from Ausgewählte Werke, 1874; English by TC

 

 

Gov. Chris Christie and Donald J. Trump at the Republican debate on January 14 in North Charleston, S.C.: photo by Eric Thayer for The New York Times, 14 January 2016 

 
Donald J. Trump at a news conference announcing the establishment of Trump University in May 2005 in Manhattan. Many of the students are now suing Mr. Trump for misrepresentation..: photo by Thomas Robinson/The New York Times, May 2005

A woman checks her cellphone before the start of a fashion show in Milan: photo by Amer Almohibany/Agence France-Presse, 26 February 2016

Tear gas is set off in Parliament in Kosovo by legislators trying to halt the election of a new president by the legislature: photo by Armend Nimani/Agence France-Presse, 26 February 2016

Tear gas is set off in Parliament in Kosovo by legislators trying to halt the election of a new president by the legislature: photo by Armend Nimani/Agence France-Presse, 26 February 2016

 

A refugee from Afghanistan prays at the train station in Tabanovce, Macedonia, where he waits for permission to cross into Serbia: photo by Marko Djurica/Reuters, 26 February 2016

An election official in Iran registers voters for parliamentary and Assembly of Experts elections at a poll in Qom, 80 miles south of Tehrant: photo by Behrouz Mehri//Agence France-Presse, 26 February 2016

The body of a Syrian boy was wrapped in shrouds after he was killed in airstrikes by Syrian government forces near Douma, east of Damascus, before the partial cease-fire: photo by Agence France-Presse, 26 February 2016



A Syrian rebel emerges from a hiding place in the town of Arbin on the outskirts of Damascus, Syria, before  a partial cease-fire that was to start at midnight: photo by Amer Almohibany/Agence France-Presse, 26 February 2016

 

 
A Syrian rebel emerges from a hiding place in the town of Arbin on the outskirts of Damascus, Syria, before  a partial cease-fire that was to start at midnight: photo by Amer Almohibany/Agence France-Presse, 26 February 2016

Fans filling the bleachers along the red carpet: photo by Monica Almeida/The New York Times, 26 February 2012


  
A firebombing damaged a hotel that had been converted into a refugee shelter in Bautzen, Germany, on Sunday: photo by. Rico Loeb/European Pressphoto Agency, 26 February 2016


 A defendant in an arson case arrived at a court in Hanover, Germany, last week. He and two others are charged with attempted murder in the firebombing of an immigrant family’s home in Salzhemmendorf.: photo by Julian Stratenschulte/European Pressphoto Agency, 26 February 2016

 

 A defendant in an arson case arrived at a court in Hanover, Germany, last week. He and two others are charged with attempted murder in the firebombing of an immigrant family’s home in Salzhemmendorf.: photo by Julian Stratenschulte/European Pressphoto Agency, 26 February 2016
 


Investigators at a house that was damaged by a fire in Vorra, Germany, in 2014. A swastika was also sprayed on the house, which had been renovated to shelter refugees. There have been almost 1,200 attacks, including some 100 arsons, on refugee shelters over the past year.: photo by Christof Stache/Agence France-Presse, 26 February 2016

A view from backstage as Julianne Moore gives her acceptance speech after winning the best actress award for “Still Alice”: photo by Monica Almeida/The New York Times, 22 February 2015

Smoke fills the auditorium of the Kosovo assembly after opposition lawmakers released tear gas canisters disrupting a parliamentary session in Kosovo capital Pristina on Friday. Kosovo opposition members have released tear gas inside Parliament as the lawmakers were readying to vote on whether to elect Hashim Thaci as the next president.: photo by Visar Kryeziu/AP, 26 January 2016

An Oscar statue stands covered with plastic at the entrance to the Dolby Theater as preparations continue for the 88th Academy Awards in Hollywood, Los Angeles, California: photo by Lucy Nicholson,/Reuters, 26 February 2016

A Sotheby’s employee stands in front of a series of portraits of the Mitford Sisters during the pre-auction preview of the personal collection of Deborah Cavendish, Duchess of Devonshire at Sotheby’s: photo by Justin Setterfield via FT Photo Diary, 26 January 2016

  

A Sotheby’s employee stands in front of a series of portraits of the Mitford Sisters during the pre-auction preview of the personal collection of Deborah Cavendish, Duchess of Devonshire at Sotheby’s: photo by Justin Setterfield via FT Photo Diary, 26 January 2016

A member of the Syria Arab Red Crescent carries a wounded boy following an airstrike in the rebel-held city of Douma in Eastern Ghouta, on Friday: photo by Abd Doumany/AFP, 26 January 2016 

 

...................................................................A man pushes a baby in a stroller in front of tents at the transit center for refugees near northern Macedonian village of Tabanovce: photo by Boris Grdanoski/AP, 26 January 2016

   

FIFA presidential candidate Gianni Infantino, of Switzerland, second left, laughs during the Extraordinary FIFA Congress 2016 held in Zurich, Switzerland. The Extraordinary FIFA Congress is being held in order to vote on the proposals for amendments to the FIFA Statutes and choose the new FIFA President.: photo by Ennio Leanza/AP 26 January 2016

Iranian women stand in line at a polling station during the parliamentary and Experts Assembly elections in Qom, Iran: photo by Ebrahim Noroozi/AP, 26 January 2016

Iraqi supporters of Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr wave the national flag as they listen to his speech during a demonstration in Baghdad's Tahrir Square: photo by Ahmad Al-Rubaye/AFP, 26 January 2016

A fake dollar bill with US Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump’s picture on it is displayed for sale with other electoral items at a roadside stall as pedestrians walk past in New York: photo by Jewel Samad/AFP, 26 January 2016

Donald Trump: illustration by Steve Bell via The Guardian, 9 December 2015

the worst people in the world

February 27, 2016, 10:56 pm

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 Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, arriving for the ceremony in 2012: photo by Monica Almeida/The New York Times

After luncheon the snow stopped, and the afternoon turned out intensely cold but bright and clear. I took a tram up the hill to Monte Carlo. The sound of firing came from the bastion below the promenade where 'Tir aux Pigeons' was advertised. Some kind of match was in progress; the competitors were for the most part South Americans with papal titles. They made very interesting gestures with their elbows as they waited for the little cages to collapse and release their game; they also had interesting gestures of vexation and apology when they missed. But this was rare. The standard of marksmanship was high, and while I was there only three birds, fluttering erratically with plucked tail and wings, escaped the guns to fall to the little boys below, who wait for them on the beach or in rowing-boats and pull them to pieces with their fingers. Often when the cages fell open the birds would sit dazed amid the debris until they were disturbed with a bowl; then they would rise clumsily and be brought down, usually by the first barrel, when they were about ten feet from the ground. On the balcony above the terrace sat one of the Casino pigeons, privileged and robust, watching the destruction without emotion. The only convincing recommendation which I heard of this sport came from one of the visitors at the Bristol who remarked that it was not cricket.

Evelyn Waugh (1903-1966): A Pleasure Cruise, from Labels: A Mediterranean Journey (1929)

Björk, at the Academy Awards in 2001: photo by Reuters

Gibraltar: Charles Pears for the Empire Marketing Board, c. 1930 (National Archives UK)

 

Jennifer Lawrence at the 2013 Academy Awards: photo by Lucy Nicholson/Reuters

Trumplandia: A Vision

February 29, 2016, 2:16 am

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Paramedics tend to a protester who was stabbed during the KKK rally in Anaheim. Many people at the park were demanding to know why police did not have a larger presence at the scene before the violence broke out.: photo by Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times, 27 February 2016

 
Ku Klux Klan rally in Anaheim erupts in violence: photo by Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times, 27 February 2016

A protester lies on the ground after being stabbed in an altercation with KKK members. Klansmen were once the dominant political force in Anaheim, holding four of five City Council seats before a recall effort led to their ouster in 1924.: photo by Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times, 27 February 2016

A Ku Klux Klansman, left, struggles with a protester for an American flag after members of the KKK tried to start a "White Lives Matter" rally at Pearson Park in Anaheim on Saturday. Three people were treated at the scene for stab wounds, and 13 people were arrested.: photo by Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times, 27 February 2016
 

Night of the Walking Slime

Jennifer Lawrence on the red carpet: photo by Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times, 29 February 2016

"The Martian" actor Matt Damon on the red carpet: photo by Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times, 29 February 2016

Taylor Kinney, left, and Lady Gaga arrive at the Oscars at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles: photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/Associated Press, 29 February 2016


"Titanic" costars Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet reunite on the red carpet: photo by Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times, 29 February 2016

 

Charlize Theron on the red carpet: photo by Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times, 29 February 2016

Night of The Pretty Interesting Quotes Gathered by the Grandson of Friedrich Drumpf, Murikan Progenitor

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump signs autographs for supporters at the conclusion of a rally at Millington Regional Jetport on Saturday in Millington, Tenn.: photo by Michael B. Thomas/AFP via NPR, 28 February 2016

Trump Won't Condemn KKK, Says He 'Knows Nothing About White Supremacists': Camila Domonoske, NPR, 28 February 2016

On the Sunday morning talk shows, Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump refused to condemn endorsements from a prominent white supremacist and former KKK leader, and said he retweeted a Mussolini quote because "it's a very good quote."

The extended conversation about white supremacists came on CNN's State of the Union, where Jake Tapper asked if Trump would distance himself from an endorsement by David Duke, former grand wizard of the Ku Klux Klan. Duke has told his radio that voting against Trump would be "treason to your heritage."

Trump refused to condemn that endorsement or say he didn't want the support of white supremacists -- four times.

"I don't know anything about David Duke. I don't know what you're even talking about with white supremacy or white supremacist. I don't know. I don't know, did he endorse me, or what's going on?" he said. That prompted a back-and-forth that went, in part:

Trump: I don't know what group you're talking about. You wouldn't want me to condemn a group that I know nothing about. ... If you would send me a list of the groups, I will do research on them and certainly I would disavow them if I thought there was something wrong.
Tapper: The Ku Klux Klan?
Trump: You may have groups in there that are totally fine and it would be very unfair. So give me a list of the groups and I'll let you know.
Tapper: I'm just talking about David Duke and the Ku Klux Klan here.
Trump: Honestly, I don't know David Duke.

As several people swiftly pointed out on Twitter, Trump hasn't always claimed ignorance of David Duke.

In 2000, when he ended his presidential campaign, Trump cited Duke's participation in the Reform Party as one reason he no longer wanted the party's nomination.

"The Reform Party now includes a Klansman, Mr. Duke, a neo-Nazi, Mr. [Pat][ Buchanan, and a communist, Ms. [Lenora] Fulani. This is not company I wish to keep," he wrote in his statement.

And as recently as Friday, Trump had disavowed Duke endorsement, without expressing any uncertainty about Duke's identity. On Sunday, he didn't reference that statement  or indicate he'd ever heard of Duke's support for him.

On MSNBC, Chris Jansing spoke to Trump's son, Donald Trump Jr., about his father's comments on State of the Union. 

He said he wasn't a campaign spokesman -- but as a spokesman for his father, he was willing to say Trump's camp didn't want the support of a former KKK leader.

"I'm pretty sure we're not interested in those kinds of votes," Trump Jr. said.

Also on the Sunday show circuit, on NBC's Meet the Press, Trump declined to distance himself from a Benito Mussolini quote he had retweeted.

Gawker has since posted to announce that the account that first tweeted the quote -- unsubtly named "@ilduce2016" -- was a bot they designed with the express purpose of tricking Trump into retweeting a line from the fascist Italian dictator.

And the ploy succeeded.

When Chuck Todd pointed out that "it is better to live one day as a lion than 100 years as a sheep" is, indeed, a famous Mussolini quote, and asked if Trump knew that, Trump said:

"It's OK to know it was Mussolini. Look, Mussolini was Mussolini. ... It's a very good quote. It's a very interesting quote."

When Todd asked if Trump wanted to be associated with a fascist, Trump said, "No, I want to be associated with interesting quotes."

He then pointed out he has millions of followers on social media, and that they appreciate his interesting posts.

"Hey, it got your attention, didn't it?" Trump said.

A protester tries to tear off the shirt of a Ku Klux Klansman. Six Klan members -- five men and one woman -- and seven protesters -– six men and one woman -- were arrested after the fracas, an Anaheim Police Department spokesman said.: photo by Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times, 27 February 2016

The Proud Heritage of Friedrich Drumpf, Murikan Progenitor

Donald J. Trump @realDonaldTrump 11h11hours ago

"@ilduce2016: “It is better to live one day as a lion than 100 years as a sheep.” – @realDonaldTrump #MakeAmericaGreatAgain"

Ku Klux Klan members ride in an automobile advertising a lecture at the Anaheim Christian Tabernacle in 1915: photo courtesy of Anaheim Public Library via Los Angeles Times, 27 February 2016

WARREN CRITICIZES 'CLASS' PARADES; Police Head Declares Neither Fascisti Nor Klan Had Any Place in Memorial March. KLAN ASSAILS POLICEMEN No Progress Made In Tracing the Slayers of Two Italians -- Seven Arraigned In Queens Battle: The New York Times, 1 June 1927

[ DISPLAYING ABSTRACT ] 

NYT June 01, 1927

Police Commissioner Warren announced yesterday that he was in favor of fewer "extraneous" parades in this city. He made this known in discussing the disorders incident to the Memorial parade when two Fascisti were killed on their way to join a detachment of black shirts in the Manhattan parade, and 1,000 Klansmen and 100 policemen staged a free-for-all battle in Jamaica.

Maybe @realDonaldTrump inherited a lifetime #KKK membership from his Dad? @tedcruz @CNN: image via Scott Wooledge @Clarknt67, 28 February 2015  Brooklyn, NYx

1927 news report: Donald Trump's dad arrested in KKK brawl with cops: Matt Blum, Boing Boing, 9 September 2015

In an article subtitled "Klan assails policeman", Fred Trump is named in among those taken in during a late May "battle" in which "1,000 Klansmen and 100 policemen staged a free-for-all." At least two officers were hurt during the event, after which the Klan's activities were denounced by the city's Police Commissioner, Joseph A. Warren.

“The Klan not only wore gowns, but had hoods over their faces almost completely hiding their identity,” Warren was quoted as saying in the article, which goes on to identify seven men “arrested in the near-riot of the parade.”

Named alongside Trump are John E Kapp and John Marcy (charged with felonious assault in the attack on Patrolman William O'Neill and Sgt. William Lockyear), Fred Lyons, Thomas Caroll, Thomas Erwin, and Harry J Free. They were arraigned in Jamaica, N.Y. All seven were represented by the same lawyers, according to the article.

The final entry on the list reads: “Fred Trump of 175-24 Devonshire Road, Jamaica, was discharged.”

In 1927, Donald Trump's father would have been 21 years old, and not yet a well-known figure. Multiple sources report his residence at the time -- and throughout his life -- at the same address.

To be clear, this is not proof that Trump senior -- who would later go on to become a millionaire real estate developer -- was a member of the Ku Klux Klan or even in attendance at the event. Despite sharing lawyers with the other men, it's conceivable that he may have been an innocent bystander, falsely named, or otherwise the victim of mistaken identity during or following a chaotic event.

The name of Trump's grandfather, Friedrich Drumpf, was anglicized to Frederick Trump, but he died several years before the report. 

A person answering calls at the N.Y.C. Police Department's Records Section said that arrest reports dating that far back were not available in any form. We've sent a formal request in writing and will update if and when we receive a response. We've also left a message with the Trump Campaign requesting a callback. 

The article, published on June 1, 1927, describes police frustration at rowdy parades, the Klan's use of masks, and its growing presence in New York City. The Klan, originally founded in the 19th century, was reborn in 1915 as a violent supremacist organization associated with lynchings, white nationalism, and the distinctive white robes and hoods used by Klansmen to conceal their identity at parades and other events. At its mid-1920s peak, it had up to 6m members, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center.

Fred Trump, who died in 1999, was a New York real estate developer and the father of mogul and presidential candidate Donald Trump. Born in the Bronx to German immigrants, Fred became a real estate developer in his teens; at about the time of his apparent arrest, he was constructing single-family houses in Queens, according to his obituary in the Times. At his death, his net worth was estimated at between $250m and $300m. A savvy businessman and real estate developer, his wealth enabled the junior Trump to start big.

If the man arrested at the riotous Klan parade was indeed Donald's father, it would not be his last tangle with the law over issues concerning minorities. A 1979 article, published by Village Voice, reported on a civil rights suit that alleged that the Trumps refused to rent to black home-seekers, and quotes a rental agent who said Fred Trump instructed him not to rent to blacks and to encourage existing black tenants to leave. The case was settled in a 1975 consent degree described as "one of the most far-reaching ever negotiated," but the Justice Department subsequently complained that continuing "racially discriminatory conduct by Trump agents has occurred with such frequency that it has created a substantial impediment to the full enjoyment of equal opportunity."

Donald Trump has made nativism a pillar of his campaign, describing Mexican immigrants as rapists and two Boston men who beat a homeless immigrant as "passionate" fans.

The events described in the Times' article took place 22 years before Donald Trump was even born, and he’s not responsible for any youthful sins his father may have committed. But given the racially-charged tone of the younger Trump's campaign, it raises questions about the values he was taught by the man whose fortune he inherited. 

According to a New York Times article published in June 1927, a man with the name and address of Donald Trump's father was arraigned after Klan members attacked cops in Queens, N.Y.: image via Boing Boing / The New York Times


A Ku Klux Klan member fought a protester for an American flag in Anaheim, Calif., on Saturday: photo by Luis Sinco/Los Angeles Times, via Associated Press, 27 February 2016 

Protesters taunt an injured Ku Klux Klansman after members of the KKK tried to start a "White Lives Matter" rally at Pearson Park in Anaheim. Witnesses said the Klansmen used the point of a flagpole as a weapon while fighting with protesters.: photo by Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times, 27 February 2016

 

People asking where #Anaheim police department was during #KKK stabbing, forgetting many were there wearing hoods...: image via immigrant @shushugah, 28 February 2016

  

Jorge Ramos: Trumplandia

No human being is "illegal" / Ningún ser humano es "ilegal": JORGE RAMOS @jorgeramosnews, 26 August 2015

Miami-based Univision anchor Jorge Ramos, left, asks Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump a question about his immigration proposal during a news conference Tuesday in Dubuque, Iowa. Ramos was later taken from the room: photo by Charlie Niebergall/AP, 25 August 2015

Trumplandia: Jorge Ramos Avalos, Univision, 26 Agosto 2015

Vamos a imaginarnos el país que quisiera Donald Trump. Trumplandia tendría un gran muro de 1,954 millas en la frontera con México. En una gigantesca operación de limpieza migratoria deportaría a más de 11 millones de indocumentados. Sus hijos nacidos en Estados Unidos no tendrían pasaporte ni país y, eventualmente, también serían deportados. Así, y solo así, Estados Unidos volvería a ser una gran nación.

Esa es la utopía que Donald Trump le está vendiendo a los norteamericanos. Pero esa utopía es una mentira. Los indocumentados no son responsables de los principales problemas del país. Lo que Trump propone es imposible de lograr. Trumplandia sería como una muy mala y tenebrosa película de ciencia ficción.

Para que Trumplandia se quedara sin indocumentados primero tendría que vivir el terror. Imagínense el horror de detener en casas, trabajos y escuelas a millones de hombres, mujeres y niños. Para lograr eso a corto plazo sería necesario usar al ejército, a la policía y a todos los agentes del servicio de inmigración. Las cortes quedarían paralizadas, desbordadas y habría violaciones masivas a los derechos humanos.

Tras las brutales redadas, sería necesario detener en estadios o en enormes lugares públicos a los indocumentados para luego ser deportados en autobuses –- a México -- y en aviones al resto del mundo. ¿El costo? Unos $137,000 millones de dólares, es decir, $12,500 dólares por inmigrante, según un cálculo de ICE. Los $10,000 millones de dólares que Trump dice tener no alcanzarían ni siquiera para deportar a un millón de personas.

Si Trumplandia cambiara la Enmienda 14 de la constitución y le quitara la ciudadanía a los hijos de indocumentados nacidos en Estados Unidos, primero tendría que deportar a 4.5 millones de esos niños que ya viven en el país. Pero ¿a qué país? Si el papá es de México y la mamá de Honduras ¿a dónde se envía un niño sin patria y sin pasaporte?

¿Qué pasaría con las madres indocumentadas después de dar a luz y con sus bebés? Sería patético meterse en el terrible e inhumano negocio de deportar bebés, niños y estudiantes.

El problema de Trumplandia, claramente, es con los mexicanos, no con los canadienses. Por eso Trump construiría un muro para separar a Estados Unidos de México. Pero, en cambio, no tocaría la frontera más grande del mundo, la que comparte por 5,525 millas con Canadá.

Construir muros es un mal negocio: cuestan mucho y no sirven. Cada milla cuesta, al menos, $16 millones de dólares (según reportó el NYT). De las 1,954 millas de frontera, ya hay muros, bardas y vallas en 670 millas. Pero en 1,284 millas no hay nada. Poner ahí un muro costaría, al menos, $20 mil millones de dólares. La fortuna de Trump alcanzaría solo para la mitad.

Pero construir ese muro sería una increíble pérdida de tiempo y dinero. Casi 40 por ciento de los indocumentados que entra a Estados Unidos lo hace por avión y, simplemente, se queda más allá del límite de sus visas. Eso no lo detiene ningún muro. Además, el muro es innecesario. La frontera sur está más segura que nunca -el número de indocumentados bajó de 12.2 millones en 2007 a 11.3 en el 2014- y tiene más de 20,000 agentes patrullándola. De hecho ya en el 2013 entraron a Estados Unidos más inmigrantes de China (147,000) que de México (125,000), según reportó el WSJ. ¿Qué piensa hacer Trump al respecto: construir otra muralla china?

Trump se equivoca. México no es parte de ninguna conspiración para enviar criminales y violadores a Estados Unidos. De hecho, su gobierno está bastante ocupado lidiando con sus propios problemas como el escape de El Chapo, la narcoviolencia, varios casos de corrupción y la acelerada devaluación del peso. Y es importante aclararlo: la mayor parte de los inmigrantes que vienen de México no son delincuentes. Todos los estudios coinciden en que los niveles de criminalidad entre los inmigrantes son menores que entre los nacidos en Estados Unidos. Punto.

Trumplandia –- esa utopía llena de muros y de odio contra los inmigrantes -- no es el Estados Unidos que yo conozco. Trumplandia sería el reino de la intolerancia, la xenofobia y la división.

Las grandes naciones se definen, no por la manera en que tratan a los ricos y a los poderosos, sino por la forma en que cuidan de los más vulnerables. Hoy, en Estados Unidos, los indocumentados y sus hijos son los más vulnerables. Y Trump decidió ir contra ellos.

Trumplandia es el horror.

  

A security guard for Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump removes Miami-based Univision anchor Jorge Ramos from a news conference Tuesday in Dubuque, Iowa. Ramos stood up and began to ask Trump about his immigration proposal: photo by Charlie Niebergall/AP, 25 August 2015

A security guard for Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump removes Miami-based Univision anchor Jorge Ramos, left, from a news conference Tuesday in Dubuque, Iowa. Ramos stood up and began to ask Trump about his immigration proposal: photo by Charlie Niebergall/AP, 25 August 2015

In Trumplandia

 

A Ku Klux Klansman is subdued and handcuffed. All of the 13 people arrested could face charges of assault with a deadly weapon, though a police spokesman said “some people could have a self-defense claim.”: photo by Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times, 27 February 2016

 

Protesters scuffle with a Ku Klux Klansman after members of the KKK tried to start a "White Lives Matter" rally at Pearson Park in Anaheim. The event quickly escalated into violence.: photo by Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times, 27 February 2016

A Ku Klux Klansman is kicked in the face by an angry protester after members of the KKK tried to start a "White Lives Matter" rally at Pearson Park in Anaheim: photo by Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times, 27 February 2016