late May

May 30, 2008—The Bush administration, owing to a court order, has released a fresh summary of federal and independent research pointing to large, and mainly harmful, impact of human-caused global warning in the US. –NYT A16

--At least 115 soldiers killed themselves, up from 102 the previous year, the Army said Thursday. NYT A11

--Twenty former US attorneys from both political parties sided with Congress and asked a federal judge to settle a subpoena fight with the White House in an inquiry into the dismissals of federal prosecutors. NYT A13

May 29, 2008.—In the past seven years, the US has dropped from 4^th to 15^th among 30 developed nations in the percentage of households that subscribe to broadband internet... WSJ A4

--Gas Prices may Send SUVs Way of Dinosaurs. WSJ D6 –like is this a hot news flash or what?

May 26, 2008—Pat Buchanan was less polite, paraphrasing the social critic Eric Hoffer: “Every great cause begins as a movement, becomes a business, and eventually degenerates into a racket.” NEW YORKER, p. 49

--Ed Rollins: Today, if you’re not rich or Southern or born again, the chances of your being a Republican are not great.—Ibid., 51.

--Last year, writing in The New Republic, Sam Tanenhaus revealed a 1997 memo in which [William] Buckley —who had originally hired [David] Brooks at National Review on the strength of a brilliant undergraduate parody he had written of Buckley—refused to anoint him as his heir because Brooks, a Jew, is not a “believing Christian.” Ibid.,52

the leadership thing

5-28-08—President Bush “convinces himself to believe what suits his needs at the moment, and has engaged in “self-deception” to justify his political ends, Scott McClellan, the former White House secretary, writes in a critical new memoir about his years in the West Wing. NYT A19

May 27

May 25, 2008—“I don’t lose sleep over it, because the realities are that, you know, Barack can get shot going to the gas station.” –Michelle Obama NYT WK 10

--this month, in case you missed it, [GWBush] told an interviewer that he had made the ultimate sacrifice of giving up golf for the war’s duration because “I don’t want some mom whose son may have recently died to see the commander in chief playing golf.” WK 11

5-24/25/2008—Higher income tax payers held on to billions of dollars more in 2006 than in 2005, thanks to a tax law change. WSJ A1, B2

--May 24, 2008—After the poor reception of [deGaulle’s] speech, Right-wing leaders and representatives of the Anciens de la division Leclerc, with the trump card of the army in their hands, tell deGaulle on what grounds they will support him. DeGaulle communicates with General Massu in Germany to work out terms for army support. [96]

weekend update

5-24/25/2008—An internal probe into the trading scandal that cost Societe Generale SA $7.7 billion depicts the French bank as a chaotic workplace in which low-level trader Jerome Kervel regularly flouted rules without adequate oversight.—WSJ B3

5-22-2008—A Pentagon audit of $8.2 billion in American taxpayer money spent by the US Army on contractors in Iraq has found that almost none of the payments followed federal rules and that in some cases, contracts worth millions of dollars were paid for despite little or no record of what, if anything, was received.—WSJ A1

--Rove was subpoenaed by a House panel to testify about alleged White House meddling in the Justice Department. –WSJ A1

--Senator John McCain on Thursday rejected the endorsement of Rev. John C Hagee, a televangelist, after a watchdog group released a recording of a sermon in which Mr. Hagee said Hitler and the Holocaust had been part of God’s plan to chase the Jews from Europe and drive them the Palestine. –NYT A15

--Judging from the futures markets, shock at the gas pump is bound to get worse. Maybe

weekend update

5-24/25/2008—An internal probe into the trading scandal that cost Societe Generale SA $7.7 billion depicts the French bank as a chaotic workplace in which low-level trader Jerome Kervel regularly flouted rules without adequate oversight.—WSJ B3

5-22-2008—A Pentagon audit of $8.2 billion in American taxpayer money spent by the US Army on contractors in Iraq has found that almost none of the payments followed federal rules and that in some cases, contracts worth millions of dollars were paid for despite little or no record of what, if anything, was received.—WSJ A1

--Rove was subpoenaed by a House panel to testify about alleged White House meddling in the Justice Department. –WSJ A1

--Senator John McCain on Thursday rejected the endorsement of Rev. John C Hagee, a televangelist, after a watchdog group released a recording of a sermon in which Mr. Hagee said Hitler and the Holocaust had been part of God’s plan to chase the Jews from Europe and drive them the Palestine. –NYT A15

--Judging from the futures markets, shock at the gas pump is bound to get worse. Maybe

may 22, 2008

May 22, 2008—Fundraising by McCain and the national Republican party topped in April the total raised by Obama and the DNC. WSJ A1

--A New Orleans levee that broke during Katrina is leaking despite $22 million in repairs. –WSJA1

--Legislation that will promote “critical analysis” of scientific issues including cloning and evolution in public schools won easy passage in a state House Committee [in Louisiana] on Wednesday. WSJ A2 [Jesus, not Darwin, fixes levees....]

sell the whole d%^&U* country

May 20, 2008--In what could be the largest privatization in the US infrastructure, a group led by Abertis Ifraestructuras SA and Citigroup Inc won bidding for the 75 year lease of the Pennsylvania Turrnpike... Abertis, which has a market value of about $20 billion, operates toll roads in France and Spain as well as such infrastructure assets as airports, telecommunications systems and parking lots. The Barcelona-based company outbid two other companies... Disclosed terms ... are similar to the privatization of Chicago’s Skyway and the Indiana Toll Road. WSJ A19

May 17

May 17/18,2008--Saudis rebuff Bush on oil; won't lift output; prices hit new high; oil surged ... to settle at a record $126.29 amid strong demand for distillates. WSJ A1--[gotta put out more than just holding hands, George W...beee-yach!!]

May 17, 2008--US set to build big new prison in Afghanistan--NYT A1 [who sez the USA is done with?]

May 17, 2008--"If something in me that can be called religious .. then it is the unbounded admiration for the structure of the world so far as science can reveal it.....the word of God is for me nothing more than the expression and product of human weakness, the Bible a collection of honorable but still primitive legends which are nevertheless pretty childish. ... As far as my experience goes [my fellow Jews] are also no better than other human groups, although they are protected from the worst cancers by a lack of power. Othwerise I cannot see anything 'chosen' about them." NYT A11 [why can't he just convert so Jesus will come back??]

May 16/17

May 16, 2008—Hundreds of thousands of French teaches and civil servants staged a one-day strike across the country on Thursday to protest government plans to cut jobs in the public sector.—NYT A12

--McCain said if elected president, he would win the Iraq war and bring most troops home by January 2013 [cutting his original 100 year deadline back by 96 years]—WSJ A1

May 17, 1968—Ignoring the objections and threats of the CGT [communist controlled trade union federation], the students start the “Long March” across Paris to the Renault works at Boulogne-Billancourt, where workers and students, despite the efforts of the CGT to keep them apart, meet. Similar meetings occur throughout the country and in some places joint committees are established. ... In Paris the Law Faculty rejects the existing consumer society... [83-84]

ides if May

May 15, 2008—The Bush administration declared the polar bear a threatened species—WSJ A3

--This week, House Republicans unveiled a campaign theme of “Change You Deserve,” which is also the promotional slogan of the common antidepressant Effexor. WSJ A6

1978, 1968

1978--“Banks are loaning money right, left and center,” the woman says with easy confidence, assuring her son that selling the house will be a cakewalk. “Small family loans. People are building. Everyone wants a piece of land. It’s the only sure investment. It can never depreciate like a car or washing machine.” ... Heh-heh. The words resonate with grim humor today in the 30th-anniversary revival of Sam Shepard’s “Curse of the Starving Class” ... “See, I always figured on the future. I banked on it. I was banking on it getting better,” he says, adding later, “I figured that’s why everyone wants you to buy things. Buy refrigerators. Buy cars, house, lots, invest. They wouldn’t be so generous if they didn’t figure you had it comin’ in. At some point it had to be comin’ in.” ... . “The whole thing’s geared to invisible money .. “You never hear the sound of change anymore. It’s all plastic shuffling back and forth. It’s all in everybody’s heads. So I figured, if that’s the case, why not take advantage of it? Why not go in debt for a few grand, if all it is is numbers? If it’s all an idea and nothing’s really there, why not take advantage?” NYT 5-13-08, B1, B5

--May 13, 1968—... general strike called by all the major trade union organizations, including the students, teachers, and lyceens ... demonstrations .. Nantes, 20,000, Marseilles, 50,000, Toulouse, 40,000. Attempts by the CGT [communist controlled trade union federation] to separate student and trade-union contingents in Paris fails. Between 3 pmand 8pm between 600,000 and 1,000,000 people (depending on estimates) march across Paris. [75]

may 12

May 12, 2008

Arts, Briefly

Nobel Regrets for Doris Lessing

Compiled by LAWRENCE VAN GELDER

Doris Lessing, the 2007 Nobel prize winner in literature, told the BBC that receiving the prize was “a bloody disaster” that brought so much attention from the news media that writing a full-length novel was next to impossible. “All I do is give interviews and spend time being photographed,” Ms. Lessing, 88, complained in a radio broadcast on Sunday. Discussing her writing, she said: “It has stopped; I don’t have any energy anymore. This is why I keep telling anyone younger than me, don’t imagine you’ll have it forever. Use it while you’ve got it, because it’ll go; it’s sliding away like water down a plug hole.”

weekend up date, May 11

May 11, 2008—On the eve of the [Iraq] war, five years ago, oil was trading at about $30 a barrel. On Friday, it closed at $125.96 a barrel. --NYT WK 3 [USA did not war in Iraq for cheap oil]

May 10, 2008—Iraq Contractor in shooting case is rehired by US; Blackwater Rebounds. NYT A1

--Better yet, the chocolatier Patrick Roger on Boulevard St. Germain is offering a paving stone—the protesters’ weapon of choice in 1968—of pure chocolate praline. It costs 49 euros (about $75!) and comes in a display-case gift box. NYT A26

May 9,2008—FBI says the military had bogus computer gear. NYT C4 [voting machines?]

--Rep. Vito J.Fossella, the Staten Island Republican who was arrested on drunken-driving charges in Virginia last week, acknowledged on Thursday that he had fathered a daughter, now 3, in an extramarital affair. NYT C1 [Spitzer trumped by Republican family values!!]

May 8 (6)

May 8, 2008—You may have heard, by the way, that residents of St. Mary’s Convent in South Bend, all in their 80s and 90s, showed up to vote on Tuesday and were turned away because of Indiana’s strict new voter ID laws. The laws are supposed to keep people from voting under assumed names, and while nobody seems able to demonstrate that ever really happens, they are demonstrably good at protecting the public from a 98-year-old ballot-wielding nun.—Gail Collins, NYT A31

--May 6, 2008—The Pentagon concluded it can’t send additional troops to Afghanistan until a sizable number withdraw from Iraq, a senior military official said.—WSJ A1

--May 8, 1968—20,000 demonstrate in Paris .;.. A student demonstration in Marseilles is supported by workers in large numbers. The demonstrators are cheered in the streets ... “where there are no police present there is no disorder.” ...Many demonstrations in Rennes, Lorient, Brest, Le Mans, St-Brieuc and Nantes are joined by both workers and students. ... The first comites d’action (action committees) are formed. Their aim is to establish grassroots democracy outside the existing political structure and to serve as counter-institutions. –REFLECTIONS ON THE REVOLUTION IN FRANCE, ed., Posner, pp 69-70

headline of the weekend

May 3-4, 2008--Republicans Seek Hearings on Dollar's Fall--WSJ A4--d'oh!!

May 2

--May 2, 2008—West Coast ports were shut down on Thursday as thousands of longshoremen failed to report for work, parat of wht their union leaders said was a one-day, one-sift protest against the war in Iraq. NYT A12

--May 1, 2008—“Hope is for the young,”—comedian Lewis Black sneering at Obama’s campaign. NYT C11

--May 2, 1968. Protests at University of Nanterre lead to a month of civil and economic disobedience by 10 million Frenchmen.

May Day

May 1, 1968—“Last May, speech was taken the way, in 1789, the Bastille was taken. The stronghold that was assailed is a knowledge meant to integrate or enclose student workers and wage earners in a system of assigned duties.”—Fr. Michel de Certeau, summer 1968; NRYB May 15, 2008, p. 58