the guy by the door …

-Ellen; calling in to Jerry Springer on Air America Radio

It is genocide and it was foretold.

Most genocides are the result of deliberate barbarous action. This one
is the result of deliberate barbarous inaction. Ned Sublette was right
across the board. Everybody did know about it for years. the Army Corps
of Engineers, the then Senator, the local paper – The Times-Picayune.   
Last year, CNN ran an public service announcement featuring the
playdough figure Mr. Bill. “Gee kids, todays show will be cancelled
becasue the levees are unsafe.”

Overwhelmed rescue workers do not have time to recover the remains of
the dead. One rescue worker was quoted as saying, “We have to push the
bodies aside. We have to focus on the living.”

The human body can survive about a day without drinking water. Many of
the people who lost all safe drinking water during the storm or shortly
after are dead now. Push their bodies aside.  Some have been
drinking the flood water. Contaminated with petrochemicals, sewage, and
vermin, many of the people who drank it are dying of diseases that will
go untreated. Push their bodies aside. Some people in the Superdome
have been evacuated to the Astrodome. But many remain and they are
dying They are coverd and left where they die.

The mayor of  New Orleans says that there are a large number of
drug starved addicts roaming the streets and they are armed. The
hospitals have been repeatedly looted for drugs. Charity hospital moved
it’s patients to the higher floors to protect them from looters. Now
they are moving them to Tulane Hospital across the street. The rich
patients were evacuated days ago.

“The best we can do is set up a perimeter around an area and hope we are not overrun.”
—-
“Let’s have a moratorium on press conferences until the people are here.
Don’t tell me there are 40,000 people coming. They’re not here.”
-Mayor Ray Nagin of New Orleasns. The full interview from Air America Radio.

Dick Chenay’s secretary “does not have handy” the date when he will return from vacation.
Condy Rice went to see Spam Alot on Broadway Wednesday night. Shopping
for shoes yesterday, she had the Secret Service remove a woman who
asked her how she dared.

Anderson Cooper saw a woman in the streets being eaten by rats. Telling
Senator Mary Landieau about this, “Do you see the anger here.”

Even Ted Koppel was outraged last night.

And it continues.

The preparation for Hurricane Katrina or lack there of raises questions. The most poignant remarks I’ve seen were posted by Ned Sublette the creator of  cowboy rumba music. Posted [with a little help from Steve Rosenfeld] on the blog of the Laura Flanders Show,
Ned asks not just why so many were left in harm’s way, but who are
they? [The original post is on the second page of comments.]
———

     camp casey is an important story, but not
when new orleans — among other things, still one
of       
     america’s most important port cities — is
about to be very possibly destroyed.  i think it’s so
far   
     beyond people’s imagination what’s about to happen that we can’t process it.  the storm is well
     above the category 5 threshold.

     and here’s the scandal:

     the poorest one-fifth or so of the city is still there in harm’s way!

     guess what color the poorest one-fifth of new orleans is.  it’s as if you had advance notice that
     mohammed atta’s crew was coming to the world trade center and evacuated all but the poor
     from it.

     everyone has known about this.  about 134,000 people in new orleans — a city which is 67%
     black — didn’t have a car.  you’re supposed to have a car.  fox news estimated that there were
     100,000 people remaining in the city, though perhaps they pulled the number out of their butt.

     it seems unlikely that the superdome won’t hold even under hours and hours
     of 175 mph winds.  but if it doesn’t?  chronicle of a genocide foretold.

     oil rig workers are being rescued from the offshore derricks, as they should be.  but why couldn’t
     air force cargo planes have evacuated *every single person*?  oh wait, only countries with very
     powerful militaries can do that. only countries that know how to get things done do things like that.

     i saw this warning on a forum and thought it was a hoax.  then i thought it
    was a hack.  it’s neither.  it’s real.

—-

Ned completes his post with an official NWS prujection of what
categories of buildins will most certainly be destroyed. Quite scary.
Thankfully, the storm has weakend slightly and turned a bit to the
east. The storm has made landfall and is expected to hit New Orleans at
about 11:00 AM.  The first three casualties were elderly people
who died evacuating their nursing home in advance of the storm. So
far the Superdome has held up, but there are holes in the roof and main power is out. Backup generators
provide no air-conditioning – only dim emergency lighting.

Oh, and crude oil hit $70/barrel.

Camp Casey, Crawford Texas – Cindy Sheehan has left Camp Casey to be with her mother who has had a stroke. She and her sister Dede Miller are making their way to their mother’s bedside according to Barry Crimins of Air America Radio. There is a sizable contingent of Gold Star Families who will remain at the camp while Cindy is on leave. Cindy is still encouraging people to go to Crawford and expects to return shortly to join them.

Update 8/19/05: Gene Ellis reporting for The Lonestar Iconoclast

“Coordinators at Camp Casey just received a phone call from Cindy Sheehan. Cindy says her mother is going to see some specialists this afternoon. Cindy said that her mother recognized her and squeezed her hand, but could not speak. Cindy is penciled in to return to Crawford on Sunday, if she can.”

Also from the Iconoclast, Gold Star Mother delivers letters to George and Laura:

“>

Prairie Chapel Road, Crawford Texas 8:14 AM.- Gold Star Mother Cindy Sheehan replied to yesterday’s Presidential press from Camp Casey outside the Bush compound. In a phone interview with Air America Radio’s Marc Maron, Cindy said, “I want to know why my son died.”

“>
Crosses provided by Veterans for Peace L.A.
Photo courtesy of the Lone Star Iconoclast

William Rivers Pitt was down there for two days posting copiously. He posted this caution:

Now there are a bunch of new folks here, and they all mean well, but
a number of them appear to be interested in dragging the whole thing
towards whatever other cause inspires them. There is Pamphleteer Guy with his anti-theocracy newspaper buttonholing
everyone he can find to buy his paper. There are the young radicals who
are arguing with themselves about what actions they can take, whether or
not those actions have anything to do with Cindy.

There is nothing wrong right now. I just hope the people who have just come,
and the people on the way, remember to be down for the main cause that
started this. It would be a real tragedy if this turned into an ANSWER rally,
with everyone rocking their own rallying cry. Right now this is laser-focused.
It needs to stay that way.

Will is now on his way back to Boston. He does plan to get back there. His posts as well as a video interview with Cindy on TruthOut.Org

It is thought that …

JILL LAWLESS, Associated Press Writer says “The police operation was carried out in at least two locations in Notting Hill about a quarter-mile apart.“ [filed 10:07 AM EST.]

The Guardian posted a report on Friday, “Huge security in London as police race against time to catch bombers “.

“>

Desiree Goodwin and Geoff Carens, her Union Representative leaving Federal Court [the House that Joe Moakley’s bricklayers built. Both are more handsome irl. :(]

Librarian and Information Science News reports:

“Talk about adding insult to injury, Desiree Goodwin , who lost her case for promotion against Harvard University and still retains the same low-paying job, has been told by her attorney, Richard Clarey, that Harvard has sent her a bill for $3,319; the legal expenses incurred during her civil rights trial against them.”

“I’ve seen it done in very big cases involving very big corporations,” said Clarey, vowing to oppose the motion. “But I’ve never seen it done in the case of a corporation whose assets (are) in excess of $23 billion. I’ve never seen it done against a plaintiff who has nothing.”

The guy by the door commentary: There were five lawyers retained by Harvard in the courtroom for the 10 days of the trial – Judith Malone of Palmer and Dodge, Richard Riley and John Coakley from Murphy and Riley, Eileen Finan from the Harvard Office of the General Counsel, and a jury consultant who declined to identify himself to me. A crude estimate of Harvard’s expenditure in the face to face portion of the trial;

[There must be an industry standard multilplier to get the real cost. Anybody?] So what is the significance of $3,319? It may be all that they can hope to win legally. How does it compare to the cost of the meetings and research to make the decision and file the court papers? I will complete my account of the trial posted at OpenHUCTW and keep you aprised of further developments here.

The top story in today’s New York Times Science section is the closing of Harvard University’s [Cambridge, MA] Oak Ridge Observatory in Harvard, MA. The reason? Light pollution due to encroaching development. The article mentions efforts by Arlington and West Medford Representative Jim Marzilli to address light pollution by requiring larger reflectors on streetlights that cast more than 30% of their energy upwards. The lighting industry has defeated his efforts several times. My question for the environmentally inquisitive; With crude oil trading at close to $60 per barrel [[[I’m old enough to remember $5 per barrel.]]] would the savings of these better street light fixtures make sense to municipal budgets and the balance of trade, [not to mention lessen the need for military incursions?] Anybody?

Update 7/8: The connection between U.S. domestic energy usage and Middle East foreign policy has been acknowledged by an apostle of the mainstream media. TV newscaster and author of “The Greatest Generation”, Tom Brokaw said on David Letterman, “If we don’t get our snout out of the oil trough, our relationship with that part of the world will continue to be … uh.. complicated.” I had asked a question pursuant to this of  former Chairmen of the Council of Economic Advisors and current Harvard economics professor N. Gregory Mankiw. Unfortunately, in his view of journalistic ethics, I’m not allowed to tell you. More as the situation develops.

On comparative economic systems. Young Dr. Rainer thinks he knows what I think. He is probably wrong.
I will not presume to deny the barbarism that his relatives may have
suffered due to Joseph Stalin. I am in general
unequivocally opposed to denying
holocausts. However, capitalism as currently configured does need more
than a light rinse. The Russian economy, however, is a problem. If
Prof. Cohen is right, that it cannot be considered capitalism by any
reasonable standard, is it an outlier? Millions of peoples lives
reduced to a dot that the “rational mind” should ignore. Weird
“science”. Worse than dismal.

“>

Perhaps something like this will make a cleaner wash.

“>

further, this is being done by the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. [I’ll look into the treatment of the Electrical Sisters.] This windmill is in Dorchester at the Freeport Street headquarters of Local 103. [And management says labor is Luddite!
Pishtosh I say! ] So bravo for the Brothers and Sisters. But are the
rest of us moving fast enough to avoid the further ravages of peak
oil?  Dr. Hubbert turned out to be right about U.S. oil production and predicted a similar phenomenon for world oil production. I can prove his theory. It was mentioned in an episode of the West Wing. Qued Erat Demonstrandum. I’m betting with him.

Like everything else in my life, this is a work in progress. I need to
see what fraction of GDP goes into the financial services sector before
deciding if the “free market” is really a costless allocator of
capital. The “empiricists” are loathe to consider this. Also, I need to
consider whether the $0.3 Trillion “incursion” in Iraq can be ignored
as a perturbation or be renormalized away, before I decide if the “free
market” is unconstrained. The answer from upstairs so far, “That was
done by another department.”

 Dr. Hubbert was not an economist, but a geophysicist. But he had an interesting idea about the interaction between physics and economics
or more correctly matter-energy and money.  Matter-energy, of
course, is conserved. Money presumably is tied to real physical wealth,
but the events of late 2001 clearly show how elastic that connection
is. Growth is assumed to be unbounded. [I guess we all agree that the
first derivative is bounded.] I think Dr. Hubbert is onto something,
but should really factor in labor. Marx had to exist, because Smith
understood the power of the division of labor, but not the power of
what was being divided up. This will, of course, get you a job as an
economist, but does it really lead to maximum productivity?

In the U.S. economy over the last three and a half decades wealth has
moved into fewer and fewer hands near the top of the distribution.
[There was a brief uptick in the Gini just before the crash of ’01. The
undergraduate who argued that this was proof of “all boats being
lifted” never came back for re-examination. 🙂 ] This may have
supported the illusion among the movers and shakers that growth is some
kind of magic that is immune to physics. There is something special
about life that it can appear to violate the 2nd Law [entropy]. But,
that is only apparent. And we can no longer afford the illusion.

[Tired. Later.]

This is DotArt:

Faces at DotArt
“>

and this is DotArt:

“>

and this is a very enticing DotArtist.

Is she, per chance, single?

Is this DotArt?

“>

Savin Hill Red Line Station closed for renovation. Definitely Dot, but is it art?

This is honoring the fallen:

“>

This is finding young ones to fall:
“>

What were you thinking?

On my way in to the City Clerk’s office at 12:50 P.M. today, I saw a Cambridge Police Officer leaning on the handrail of the great stairs. He was playing with a switchblade knife. This seemed inappropriate to me.

“>

THE REVOLUTION WILL NOT BE TELEVISED
June 22
250 Jefferson Lecture Hall
Harvard University, Physics Dept.
Cambridge, MA
7:00pm-9:30pm
17 Oxford St. (near Science Center)
Suggested donation $5

HUGO CHAVEZ ELECTED PRESIDENT OF VENEZUELA IN 1998, IS A COLORFUL, UNPREDICTABLE FOLK HERO, beloved by his nation’s working class and a tough-as-nails, quixotic opponent to the power structure that would see him deposed. Two independent filmmakers were inside the presidential palace on April 11, 2002, when he was forcibly removed from office. They were also present 48 hours later when, remarkably, he returned to power amid cheering aides. Their film records what was probably history’s shortest-lived coup d’�tat. It’s a unique document about political muscle and an extraordinary portrait of the man The Wall Street Journal credits with making Venezuela “Washington‚s biggest Latin American headache after the old standby, Cuba.”

guy by the door commentary: The Bush administration, in the person of Colin Powell, took the trouble to denounce this guy in the press. He must be doing something right.

“>
Dr. Gerson simply must play himself in the movie. No casting director
could improve on what the Society of Friends has already done.

My Communication to City Council about the Arrests.

The Mayor made an elaborate claim of no wrong doing. At best he proved misfeasance. Stay tuned.

Prologue: 9:45 AM Hey! Leave those kids alone!!

“>	“>
Photos: jonny rebellious	Boston Independent Media Center

Climax 11:00 AM Boston Independent Media shows some [more] of the seven arrests and the relative turnout of protester vs. supporters. [Lots of pics, scroll.] The Smedley Butler Brigade was there.

“>	“>
Mayor, band – command performance.	All volunteer audience.

Anti-climax 12: 30 PM My Law and Lunch shows the strength of support for the war.

For epilogue, I appeal to the blogosphere and to English Lit to enlighten me on the quote “Whereof what’s past is prologue, what to come
In yours and my discharge.”
Does this mean what the folks at the National Archives seem to think it means?

“You! You’re out!”
“Why?”
“Because!”
Officer More Temperate [also not wearing his badge] said, “Because you’ve been asked.”

Officer UDHBN then pushed me 30 or  40 ft to the gate. I noticed
an Officer wearing his ID. He identified himself to me as Sargent
Ahern. Later he posed for me. I met the ACLU lady. If any onlookers
have pictures of me being ejected from the Free Speach
Zone, I would appreciate your sending them to me. We really do need to
identify Officer UDHBN. I do have pictures for you, but I have to write
up a more detailed
statement for the ACLU.

We don’t need no thought control.

“>

“>

“>

All in all it’s just another brick in the wall. -Pink Floyd

I missed the BlackHawk helicopter. A deputy Rumy came.

From the Cape, Eric Schwaab reports firsthand accounts of nstar linemen in his blog and blog community.

Pix from a guy on the picket line. No addresses 🙁 . Naysayers might ? their “probative value.” Lets look around and report to local government.- inspectional services and legislative [e.g. City Council] and, of course, the BLOGosphere. Exact address is essential, picture is good but optional.

Cambridge and Boston both support Local 369. I’m going to Boston CC tomorrow.

If you don’t do electoral politics, Mass Jobs with Justice offers action links.

Birobidzhaner, blogging from the left, reports on the Monday rally.

This is mostly a tease to be edited in due course. But while we work out what is and is not “on the record”. I leave y’all with just this one.

Outsourcing is only “importing service”, if the workers are somewhere else.

Curiously, in this one case at least, Harvard Administration is more up on econonmics than Harvard Economics. Administration simply uses neither term. Problem solved. However, HCECP, aka the Katz Committee, determined that outsourcing did happen to the tune of 1000 workers up from the original “only seven” claim during the sit-in on Mass Hall in Spring 2001. HCECP had a website chronicling the adjustments that were made. H.E.R.E. and S.E.I.U. did get some improvement in their contracts. H.U.S.P.M.G.U. got a tiny bit, but they have since had 20 or 30 jobs outsourced.
Officialdom of H.U.C.T.W. said, “We’re just fine thank you very much.” My unit was about half contingent workers.

What has happened to “H.E.R.E. and S.E.I.U. since? The HCECP website declared “problem solved” and disappeared. Folks in the Unions tell me that outsourcing, has started moving in again. There have been new “direct’ hires in my unit, but it seems like even more new contingent workers. Administration’s response is to give the new VP woman for Human Resources an “HCECP Fellow.” I’m not holding my breath.

This discussion, by the way, is “on the record.”

Alerted by mailing lists of the Harvard Social Forum and the Progressive Student Labor Movement, students and workers from Harvard joined members of the Utility Workers Union of America Local 369 on the picket lines at local NStar installations. Students mostly went to the nearest installation in Somerville. Many Harvard workers, however, cannot afford to live near campus since the end of rent control. Most live in communities like Jamaica Plain and Dorchester:

“>

Women and men of UWUA in Dorchester. [This blog lives on a server in Cambridge :)]
Maureen is secretary for DigSafe, Joanne for Underground. And friends.

Unlike Harvard, all the workers are in the same union. The men mostly aren’t clerical workers but technical workers. They could be the Nstar Union Clerical and Technical Workers [NUCTW] if they wanted to. I think they like the current arrangement better.

The two largest issues are:

1. Compromised safety due to understaffing.
2. Attack on pension benefits.

The union members have community support.

“>

Councillor at Large Maura Hennigan representing the City of Boston and friends.

“>

The guy by the door representing Harvard Union Labor, Harvard Social Forum,
and Progressive Student Labor Movement and friends.

“>

And it goes on into the night.

The bride who was in the limo that became an inferno by Johnston Gate back on April 30 commented my post about it and Ezra Ball’s blog. As my new blogbuddy felicia says,  “you make my life beautiful and excellentacious!” Let me quote the bride here:

I am the bride who escaped from the burning limo – rather dramatic
start to my wedding, but we’re glad everyone was okay. We didn’t crash
into the gate, the limo was basically smoking the whole ride, though
the driver kept telling us it was just “burning off extra oil”…Also, the limo
company was Discover Boston, and they have done NOTHING to compensate
us for this – they haven’t even refunded our money!

An excerpt of her comment at Erza’s RealFake blog:

We were never interviewed by the police, so I’m not sure if there is
any investigation going on. The limo company has done NOTHING to
address the situation. The[y] didn’t even send back up transportation to
get us to the reception! Everyone was fine, but all my bridesmaids’
things (in the trunk) were ruined, and our lives were all at risk. I
feel worst for my bridesmaid who was 8 months pregnant, and for my 3
year old flower girl, and for my poor parents.



Dear Carrie,

There’s a bounty of bloggers who are glad everyone is
okay.  Thank you for shedding light on the origin of the fire.
There were questions of  intrigue and foul play. More than one
blogger wondered if someone  important was in the limo – one
thought maybe the President of Harvard.
I knew that wasn’t the case.
His limo is not white, not a stretch, and has a distinctive license
plate.  [ I know Joe, the driver. He drove for the old guy too.]
But when some bloggers said “oh just a car fire,” I was upset.
Anyone who saw the huge flames [shown by the Crimson and felicia]
could see that something really awful might have happened to someone.
In my view, there WAS someone important in that limo. How very nice to
meet you, I hope to meet the others with you.

Without further ado:

Congratulations on your wedding to you and yours!

 I‘m thinking “yours” means “Mr. Carrie”, but the
congratulations are unconditional. [ I am very proud of the Clerk of
the City of Cambridge, Margaret Drury, opening her office at midnight
on the first day it was legal for gay couples to wed.]

I would not rule out legal action, but we may not have to go that far.
Perhaps if we alert the blogosphere we can shame these folks into doing
the right thing. I suppose we can let the mainstream media in on it
eventually. And if push comes to shove, there are a lot of lawyers near
the Berkman Center where this blog lives.  But we need one thing
from you. Would you tell us which of the several Google hits for
“Discover Boston” is the website of the company you hired? We’ll take
it from there.

4:40 PM Littauer Library, North Yard. “There’s a
fire.” A woman patron pointed toward Johnston Gate where there was a
ferocious blaze with flames a few feet high and clouds of smoke 20 or
30 feet into the air. The Cambridge Fire Department was already on the
scene. By the time I got outside and found a camera angle clear of the
trees CFD had already knocked down the flames. Twenty minutes later,
after we closed the library, this was the scene:

Cause: Believed to be equipment malfunction.
Injuries: [Thankfully] none.

Update:  Sunday May 1, 5:45 PM. Michael Feldman,
who publishes Dowbrigade news, and is also a member of the Berkman
Thursday Blogger Group has pictures and description earlier in the event. Michael is an actual journalist – fully trained and he teaches journalism at BU.

One more picture from Ezra Ball.

Update II: Wed May 3

Felicia, a student based in Cambridge, and a friend saw the beginning of the fire. Her blog has a dramatic picture [taken by Andrew Fong] and an eyewitness account including:

“…when we first saw it from near the body shop, it was just smoldering,
but by the time we went inside the yard and were checking out the john
harvard statue, the limo had become a massive ball of flames.”

The event was also reported in the Monday, May 2 issue of The Harvard Crimson, including a picture by Jonathon Tsao from a similar angle to Fong’s picture, but somewhat closer.

Opinion:  This first hand account seems to rule out
the theory of an explosion. It does, however, confirm that the fire was
fast moving. Jonathon Tsao’s  and Andrew Fong’s pictures confirm
that the event was as dramatic as eyewitnesses [including me]
said.  Questions about the origin were not unreasonable. They are
still worth a follow up. If there was no accelerant of any kind, we
ought to look at whether the upholstery materials used are adequately
fire retardant.