May
31
Memento Mori, Gentlemen
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by Michael Winship
As children, death was frightening and foreign; we were taken to faraway towns where relatives had died, but thought too young and impressionable to actually attend the funeral or see the deceased. The first body I ever saw in a casket was when I was a sophomore in high school. It was the father of a friend. The next one I saw was my own father.
We were asked whether we wanted an American flag draped over his coffin. It was his due; he had served during World War II as an Army medical supply officer and like so many of his generation the war had been a turning point in his life.
But in 1971, it was unusual for someone who hadn’t made a career in the military to have a flag covering his casket. Plus, the Vietnam War still raged and the flag was a symbol with a lot of emotional and political baggage. Toward the end of Dad’s life, Republican though he was, he actually had come to oppose what was happening in Southeast Asia.
A compromise was reached. During calling hours, a portly member of the American Legion or VFW, in Eisenhower jacket and campaign cap, marched into the funeral parlor and stiffly handed my slightly startled mother a flag, folded in a proper military triangle and encased in plastic. I never saw it again.
Since then, many other funerals, many memorial events for the passing of friends and family. There seem to be more lately, especially in the last year or two; a function of my age and that of colleagues and acquaintances perhaps. But with the passing of time, they somehow seem less morbid and forbidding, less occasions of childish dread than celebrations of lives well led.
Read more
May
28
Tony Blair: Goodbye to All That
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by Michael Winship
LONDON — It’s Iraq wot done him in. Tony Blair, that is.
What began with such promise when he became the British prime minister in 1997 is over, as dead as mutton. Blair can thank his pal the American president for that, as well as his own hubris.
When Sir Christopher Meyer became British ambassador to the United States he was instructed by Blair’s chief of staff to get up the backside of the White House as far he could and stay there. Only Blair’s aide didn’t say backside.
(As the New York Times once euphemistically quoted Mayor Ed Koch when he was especially vexed by then City Council President Carol Bellamy, “He told her to kiss him and then said where.”)
At the time, what probably was meant was that on Blair’s behalf Ambassador Meyer needed to firmly align (or insert) himself with Washington primarily as a safeguard for British interests but also as an intermediary if it seemed the White House was about to do something truly nuts globally. Blair seems to have attached himself to the first part of that notion and either ignored the latter or thought that his voice of reason would prevail over his cowboy American cousin. As we say here in the United Kingdom, fat chance.
So now Blair is out, sooner than he would have liked. This has led to a situation unique in British political history. While we Americans are accustomed to a two and a half month interlude between the time a new president is elected in November and their inauguration the following January, the British are nonplussed that there now will be a six-week wait until June 27th, when current Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown becomes the next prime minister.
May
18
A Few Words from Randy Newman
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May
15
The American Media and You(Tube)
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My good friend and former Maine Attorney General Jim Tierney told me about Net Neutrality a few years ago. “This is going to be a huge issue,” he said. “Sure, sure,” I thought. He was half right–it has become an important issue. But, frustratingly, not a big issue. I’m shocked at how many otherwise well-informed people have never even heard of it.
It’s simple. The big cable and phone companies want to be able to let you access some websites faster than others. Since high speed internet for 90% of all Americans is only available through their cable or phone company, that makes it relevant to all of us. Think about how this would work: if AT&T partnered with (read: got paid by) Microsoft, you would be able to get to the MSN search engine more quickly than, say Google or Yahoo. But really what would happen is all the big boys would have the cash to make sure they stayed in the fast lane, while start ups or small organizations would be relegated to a second tier of service. That would have two general effects. First, it would make it hard for a new YouTube or MySpace to get going, because the established media giants would have a big, high speed advantage. Secondly, all the people who have found a voice on the internet when the main strem media had shut them out would find themselves slipping back into obscurity.
It’s simple, really. Big, corporate controlled media companies don’t want the competition from the little guy who might offer something fresher and more orignial. The established conglomerates don’t want the divergent opinions and criticisms of citizens messing up their snug little nests.
There are Net Neutrality bills up in state legislatures (a hearing in the Maine legislature on LD 1675 is Thursday) and in Congress. You can learn more about the issue, and what you can do to help, right here.
Meanwhile, Rick Kaempfer made this video which he sent me today:
May
15
Keep Out the Vote
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by Michael Winship
It’s a John Grisham novel, this whole scandal swirling about the Justice Department. Like “The Pelican Brief” maybe, in which the motive for the murder of two Supreme Court judges of disparate ideologies remains mysterious until a plucky law student turns up an obscure case on appeal that would ravage protected wetlands for oil and gas development. Mayhem ensues.
In other words, nothing is as it first seems and it can take a while before some semblance of truth emerges. Especially in Washington, home of the scheme and the fraud. You have to peel back the layers of the onion, just as that plucky law student did (pluckily played in the movie version by plucky Julia Roberts).
What’s the real motive for knocking off those eight, now nine, maybe more US attorneys — Republican appointees all — apparently replaced for insufficient fealty to the Bushie party line? In part, the truth may be lurking in the upcoming 2008 elections.
The White House, Attorney General Gonzales and the Justice Department have tried to hide their real reasons, citing “performance concerns” as the reason for firing the prosecutors and blaming various underlings for mishandling the dismissals, then throwing them to the wolves, too — the latest being Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty, who announced his resignation Monday. McNulty’s the guy who indiscreetly told a Congressional hearing that the person behind the dismissal of Arkansas US Attorney Bud Cummins was Karl Rove, who wanted Cummins replaced with his buddy Tim Griffin. Oops.
Scratch the surface of anything vaguely nefarious at 1600 Pennsylvania and sooner or later you’re likely to hit The Rovester. His most famous bit of dark wizardry is to take a negative about his own guy and turn it into a positive — or, rather, a negative against the other side. In 2004, Rove defused rumors about the president’s blotchy National Guard career by orchestrating attacks on John Kerry’s legitimate Vietnam combat record. The Swift Boat Vets for Truth set sail and the rest is revisionist history. Klassic Karl.
May
8
Her Majesty and the Commander Guy
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by Michael Winship
A number of years ago, I was attending a film festival in Bristol, England, the official patron of which was Prince Philip. On the closing 
night, the awards ceremony was delayed and delayed pending the arrival of the royal hubby.
Finally, we were told it would be at least another hour until His Tardiness appeared. As several of us bolted for the nearest pub, I heard one Brit say to another, “The Yanks and Aussies can’t understand why we’re waiting.”
When HRH finally turned up, after much pomp, he apologized for the circumstance. Couldn’t be helped, he explained. The Royal Train had collided with one of the royal sheep.
I hate when that happens and I’m sure you do, too.
May
4
A Military Man and a Madam
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This whole business about the DC Madam isn’t, frankly, very interesting to me. Unless she reveals that one of her best clients was Karl Rove and he likes to dress up in a Nazi uniform, it just doesn’t hold my attention. Except for one name that keeps coming up: Harlan Ullman. (Here’s one story about how he may testify against her.)
I interviewed this guy last summer about the war in Iraq. I was impressed with him and, to be completely honest, don’t think much differently of him even if what the DC Madam says is true. I like the woman I buy coffee from in the morning and the fellow who works at the hardware store and helps me find exactly the thing I’m looking for–and maybe parts of their private lives are “different.” I’m not in their private lives so I don’t really care.
Mostly, this is an excuse to yet again flog an old interview. It is here, in two parts. (I wonder if, while he was talking to me, he was daydreaming about what he’d do later that night….)
May
3
During tonight’s Republican Presidental Debate, when the ten white men on the stage were asked if any of them don’t believe in evolution, not one, not two, but THREE hands went up.
No doubt, if any of these guys get elected, we could expect the Creation Museum in Petersburg, Kentucky to become a nantional park.
Here’s the video, which might take a moment or two to load:
May
3
A Few Good Men and Women on Darfur
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There is an awful lot the US can do, that we’re not doing now, to stop the genocide in Darfur. Enforcing the no-fly zone over Darfur would be a nice start. Increased humanitarian and security aid to groups like the African Union, pressure on China to stop supporting the government of Sudanese President al-Bashir, and increased unilateral and multilateral sanctions would help, too.
The public officials who have made ending the genocide in Darfur one of their priorities is small, but growing. For example, this week nearly every US Senator signed a letter to the Chinese president asking him to stop supporting the government in the Sudan. But some politicans have done a lot more than sign letters or wring their hands and express their “concern.” Take Congressman Jim McGovern, for example. He got himself arrested. McGovern was one of five memebers of Congress who set up a protest last spring outside the Sudanese Embassy in Washington, until the cops rolled in and charged them with disorderly conduct and an illegal demonstration.
I had a chance to listen to McGovern speak and then talk to him afterwards at the Darfur rally in Boston on Sunday (for more, see below.) This guy is definitely doing more than just “talking the talk.”
Here’s the video:
May
3
Darfur Die-In Video
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May, 2007
Boston
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