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Today's
Stories
January 16-18, 2009
Alexander Cockburn
Hail to the Chief
Jeffrey St. Clair
High Plains Grifter: Geo. W. Bush, a Concise Biography
January 15, 2009
Pam Martens
Wall Street Powerhouses Invested Alongside Madoff
Karl Grossman
Obama and the Military - Industrial - Scientific Complex
M. Shahid Alam
Gaza's Shattered Mirror
Jules Rabin
Gaza Besieged, Gaza Mauled
Alan Farago
The Nail-Gun Bailout
Ron Jacobs
The State of Black America: From Oscar Grant to Barack Obama
Timothy Seidel
Just Violence in Gaza? The Calculus of Proportionality
George Ochenski
Why No Montana Wilderness?
Todd Chretien
Taking a Stand for Justice in Oakland
Bob Fitrakis /
Harvey Wasserman
Obama's Marijuana Prohibition Acid Test
Website of the Day
Uranium Watch
January 14, 2009
Henry A. Giroux
Killing Children With Impunity
Kathy Kelly
Cease Fire, Cease Siege
Franklin Lamb
A Second Front? Hezbollah Militants Chafe as Gaza Burns
Mike Whitney
The Big Contraction: Why the Stimulus Alone Won't Work
Paul Craig Roberts
The Humiliation of America
Glen Ford
Sullying Dr. King's Legacy: the Congressional Black Caucus and Israel
Aditya Chakrabortty
The End of Property Porn
Dave Lindorff
Fattening the Rats: Feeding at the Bailout Trough
Jonathan Cook
Israel Bars Arab Parties From Elections
David Swanson
Conyers Explains Why He Didn't Push Impeachment
Martha Rosenberg
Fragile: Handle with Risperdal
Website of the Day
Report of a Red Cross Worker in Gaza
January 13, 2009
Norman Finkelstein
The Facts About Hamas and the War on Gaza
Jonathan Cook
Is Israel Using Experimental Weapons in Gaza?
Michael Neumann
Hamas and Gaza: Slave Revolts and Passionate Evasions
Coleen Rowley /
William John Cox
No Victors in the War on Dissent
Robert Sandels
Cuba and the Obama Administration: Subversion Through Trade?
Saul Landau
The Changeling:
an Obama Nightmare
David Swanson
What to Ask Eric Holder
Wajahat Ali
Waltzing with War Crimes
Sam Bahour
No Other Option? A View From the West Bank
Stanley Heller
Why It's Useless to Lobby Congress on Gaza
Robert Jensen
Beyond Grief and Rage
Robin Mittenthal
Eating Away at the Land That Feeds Us
Website of the Day
The 50 Most Loathsome People in America
January 12, 2009
Uri Avnery
The Blood-Stained Monster Enters Gaza
Paul Craig Roberts
Our Collapsing Economy
Mike Whitney
Israel's Moral and Political Insanity
Ewa Jasiewicz
Oh, Quiet Night: Only Six Homes Were Bombed
Bill Quigley
A Day in Gaza
Dave Lindorff
From Vietnam to Gaza
Bill and Kathleen Christison
Blowback From a Tragic Error: a Message to Barack Obama
Jonathan Cook
Israel Ponders the Third Stage
Andy Worthington
Seven Years of Guantánamo
Kara N. Tina
Oakland on Fire
Brenda Norrell
Palestinians and American Indians:
Russell Means Breaks the Silence on Obama
Nour Kharma
A Plea From a Teen in Gaza: "Will I Die, Too?"
Website of the Day
The Villages Group: an Antiwar Alliance in Sderot
January 9/11, 2009
Alexander Cockburn
Israel's Onslaught on Gaza: Criminal, for Sure; But Also Stupid
Kathy Kelly
Tunnel Vision: Report from Arish, Egypt
Bill Quigley
Report From Rafah:
Doctors Stopped at the Border
George Ciccariello-Maher
Oakland's Not for Burning?
Elaine C. Hagopian
Gaza: History Matters
Mike Roselle
Drowning in a Toxic River: What Can be Done to Save Appalachia?
Steve Hendricks
The Torturer-Elect?
Gary Leupp
Revisiting the Tale of Samson
Jonathan Cook
Outcry Over Israel's War Crimes
Karim Makdisi
The Ceasefire Plan: the UN Finally Acts, But Does It Mean Anything?
Rannie Amiri
Livni's Big Lie
Peter Morici
In the Jaws of a Depression
Peter Montague
Can Chemicals be Regulated?
Ralph Nader
Move Fast to Restore the Rule of Law
Andy Worthington
The Dying Days of the Guantánamo Trials
Nadia Hijab
A Music School Silenced in Gaza
Dan Bacher
Unholy Alliance:
Nature Conservancy Backs Schwarzenegger's Big Ditch
Catherine Fenton
The American Peace Movement and Israel
David Macaray
Wal-Mart Caught Stealing
Valia Kaimaki
Why Greek Youths Took to the Streets
Richard Morse
Haiti's Gas Gang
David Yearsley
To Gotham City with Dexter Gordon
Charles R. Larson
The Horror, the Horror
Richard Rhames
Gaza and the Goon Squad Meet the Wizard
Stephen Martin
Meltdown Memo to Come?
Lorenzo Wolff
What They Sing About When They Sing About Love
Poets' Basement
Anderson, Beatty and Valentine
Website of the Weekend
Gaza Protest
January 8, 2009
Jean Bricmont /
Diana Johnstone
Gaza Seen From Paris
Franklin Lamb
How Dershowitz Misstates, Misrepresents and Misapplies the Law
Paul Craig Roberts
The Difficulty of Being an Informed American
Kevin Alexander Gray
Give Burris His Seat
Chris Floyd
The Enduring Priorities in Obama's Time of Change
Ewa Jasiewicz
Riding on Fire in Gaza
Steve Conn
Sanjay Gupta and Obama
Harvey Wasserman
Kill the Nuclear Stimulus!
Wayne S. Smith
An Opening to Cuba?
Linda Mamoun
Re-settling Gaza: the Real Goal of the Israeli Invasion?
Adam Turl
Unions and Young Workers
Chris Papaleonardos
Mourning Maria Dimitriadi
Website of the Day
On the Wing
January 7, 2009
Saree Makdisi
What Kind of Security Will This Barbarism Bring Israel?
Franklin Lamb
Bend Over Professor Dershowitz, It's Time for Your Check Up
William Blum
America's Other Glorious War
Belén Fernández
The Trauma Vortex: Israel's Monopoly on Psychological Suffering
Lawrence Davidson
What is New About Gaza?
Allan Nairn
Adm. Dennis Blair and the Church Killings in East Timor
Jonathan Cook
What is Israel's Objective?
Muhammad Idrees Ahmad
Watching the War on BBC
Deepak Tripathi
Bush, as He Leaves
Cal Winslow
Now is the Hour to Defend Democracy in the Labor Movement!
Manuel Garcia, Jr.
To Students Planning Careers: Be Mindful
Dr. Hannah Safran
No More Recycled Military Solutions
Website of the Day
CNN: Israel Broke the Ceasefire First
January 6, 2009
Pam Martens
It's All One Big Lie
Victoria Buch
Real Estate War in Gaza: the History and "Morals" of Ethnic Cleansing
Neve Gordon
Israel's New War Ethic
Tami Sarfatti /
Yonatan Mendel
What Silence Says:
Gaza is Still Waiting on Obama
Mike Whitney
The Gaza Bloodbath
Alan Farago
After the Fall
Gary Leupp
A Hamas Coup d'Etat in 2007?
Larry Everest
Silent Partner: the US-Backed War on Gaza
Ron Jacobs
The New Iraqi Sovereignty
David Macaray
Union-Busting is Alive and Well
Stephanie Basile
Where's Anna's Money?
Stacey Warde
An Uncle's Unrest
Website of the Day
Israeli Refusenik on Gaza
January 5, 2009
Paul Craig Roberts
Will There be a Recovery?
Sousan Hammad
Phoning Home to Gaza
Wajahat Ali
Flying While Brown
Mats Svensson
Longing in Gaza
Jen Marlowe
Abeer's Baby
Muhammad Ali Khalidi
Gaza Phone Tag
Brian Cloughley
Israel is Immune From Criticism
Faheem Hussain
Gaza and India: a View From Pakistan
William Cook
Consider the Realities of Gaza
Dr. Trudy Bond
The Madness Among Us
Christopher Ketcham
The Revenge of the Blogger at the National Press Club: a Rotten Washington Interlude
Steve Early
Who Rules SEIU?
Dave Lindorff
When It Comes to Terrorism and POW Cases, Equal Justice Under Law is a Joke
Website of the Day
The Endangered Fish of the Colorado River Basin
January 2 - 4, 2009
Alexander Cockburn
Diary of 2008: an Incredible, Hope-Filled Year
Uri Avnery
Molten Lead in Gaza
Jonathan Cook
The Real Goal of the Gaza Assault
Paul Craig Roberts
Whatever Happened to Western Morality?
Brian Eno
Stealing Gaza: an Experiment in Provocation
Ralph Nader
America Must Stop Shirking Its Responsibility on Gaza
Omar Barghouti
UN Complicity in Israel's Massacre in Gaza
Graham Usher
Where Pakistan's Generals and the ISI Draw Their Lines
P. Sainath
The Economy is Worse Than It Appears
Belén Fernández
Pardon Our Dust: Israel's PR Campaign for Gaza
Deb Reich
Shiv'a in Gaza, December 2008
Gary Leupp
Defacing Mr. Jefferson's Wall: Preachers and the Inauguration
Michael Yates
Top Chef or Top Wage Thief? Tom Colicchio and the Economics of Restaurants
Joanne Mariner
How to Close Guantánamo
Seth Sandronsky
Funding the Israeli Military: the US Pipeline
Cynthia McKinney
We Lived to Tell the Story
Sonja Karkar
Israel's Dogs of War
Deepak Tripathi
Gaza in Perspective
Robert Fantina
Obama, Afghanistan and Israel
John Ross
The Year No One Can Remember
Norm Kent
The Heat on Duval Street: Why Head Shop Raids are Unfair and Unjust
Larry Portis
Syria and the Arab Barbie Doll--Before the Deluge
Richard Rhames
Is Conscience Dead?
Dee C. Lubell
We Come From the Sun: Zora Neale Hurston and Richard Wright
David Yearsley
A Gay German at the Courts of the Medici and Hanover, and of Course the BBC
Lorenzo Wolff
Joe Ely, the Fighting Rooster of Rock
Marc Catone
Looting Lennon's Legacy
Poets' Basement
Five Poems by
Grzegorz Wróblewski
Website of the Weekend
Earth in High Rez
January 1, 2008
Jennifer Loewenstein
If Hamas Did Not Exist
Oren Ben-Dor
The Self-Defense of Suicide
Wajahat Ali
The U.S. Response to the Gaza Crisis: Unfair and Unbalanced
Saul Landau
In Cuba No One Man Could Steal $50 Billion From Other People
David Michael Green
What to Expect While We're Expecting
Website of the Day
Morbid Anatomy
December 31, 2008
Pam Martens
Wall Street's Collapse and the Ownership Society
Neve Gordon /
Jeff Halper
Where's the Academic Outrage Over the Bombing of a University in Gaza?
Ted Honderich
The First Casualty of Israel's War
Brian Cloughley
Five Little Girls on a Sofa: Gaza's One-Sided Images
Ron Jacobs
What is Hamas, Really?
Vijay Prashad
Hot Rod and His Sikh Warrior:
Blago's Indian Connections
Franklin Lamb
Mr. Mubarak, Tear Down That Wall!
Mike Whitney
My Brilliant Career
David Macaray
What Really Killed the Auto Bailout
Richard Thieme
The Betrayal of the Commons
Mary Lynn Cramer
Who Wins What in Gaza?
Stephen Lendman
The Troubling Case of the Fort Dix Five
Worthy Group of the Day
Western Shoshone Defense Project
December 30, 2008
Paul Craig Roberts
May We No Longer Be Silent
Tariq Ali
The Gaza Ghetto and Western Cant
Robert Bryce
The $775,000-a-Year GI
Jonathan Cook
Electioneering with Bombs
Gary Leupp
The Fishbarrel War
Dave Lindorff
Tough Guys Don't Walk: Will Cheney Seek a Pardon?
Brian McKenna
Ted Downing and Troublemaker Anthropology
John Walsh
The End of the Green Party
Ramzy Baroud
Gaza and the World
Bob Sommer
The Education of David Frost
Worthy Activist of the Day
Support Marie Mason
December 29, 2008
Jennifer Loewenstein
Israel's Attempted Endgame in Gaza
Neve Gordon
What, Exactly, is Israel's Mission?
Joshua Frank
Obama and the "Special Relationship"
George Salzman /
Manuel Garcia, Jr.
The War Against Palestine: Exception From Humanity
Norman Solomon
A Hundred Eyes for an Eye
Ewa Jasiewicz
Gaza Today: "This is Just the Beginning"
Rob Larson
The Banks Laugh All the Way to the Bank
Kenneth Libby
Arne Duncan's Dark Years in Chicago
Robert Weissman
The 10 Worst Corporations of 2008
Elsa Johnson
High Noon at Black Mesa: Bush's Farewell Gift to Peabody Coal
Nicola Nasser
Resolution 1850: Bush's Parting Gift
Belén Fernández
Hanukkah Games
Worthy Group of the Day
Nuclear Information and Resource Service
December 26-28, 2008
Alexander Cockburn
The Medusa's Head
Dr Eyad Al Serraj
The Boming of Gaza: "An Earthquake on Top of Your Head"
Jeffrey St. Clair
Cancerous Air
Bradley Simpson
Obama's New Intel Chief, Dennis Blair, Ran Interference for Indonesia's Butchers
Ralph Nader
Government Without Laws
Gary Leupp
Obama and the Graveyard of Empires
Ellen Cantarow
Richard Falk, Israel and the NYT
Matt Landon
The Great Coal Ash Flood: a Report From Swan Pond Road
David Macaray
SAG's Terrible Dilemma
Patrick Bond
End of Neoliberalism? Sorry, Not Yet
Norm Kent
Invoking Bigotry: Obama and Rick Warren
Brian T. Ketcham
Fuel Efficiency is Easy--Just Don't Let Detroit Tell You How to Do It
Rannie Amiri
War Clouds Over Gaza
Larry Portis
Changing the Ethnic Vocabulary
Richard Rhames
Welcome to Soup Kitchen America
Stephen Lendman
29 Red Flags: Early Suspicions About Bernard Madoff
James L. Secor
Unheralded Coup
Ramzy Baroud
Iraq, the Plot Thickens
Harold Pinter
Art, Truth and Politics: the Nobel Lecture
Cpt. Paul Watson
Tracking the Cetacean Death Star
Howard Lisnoff
Nixon's Cambodian Shock Treatment
Michael Dee
The Bill of Rights, Killed in Action by the War on Drugs
Steve Conn
Eight Predictions for 2009
Poets' Basement
Valentine, Kaung, Moser and Graham
Worthy Group of the Weekend
United Mountain Defense
December 25, 2008
Judy Gumbo Albert
What Were Those 1960s Terrorists Thinking, Anyway?
Rev. William E. Alberts
The Sole of Christmas
Hannah Mermelstein
Caution: Settlers Ahead
Worthy Group of the Day
Citizens' Coal Council
December 24, 2008
Bill Quigley
Five Bailout Lessons From Katrina
Saul Landau
Then and Now: Venezuela and Cuba, 1960-2008
Sam Smith
Evangelism and Politics
Brian Cloughley
Torture, Slaughter and Lies
John Ross
Where's al-Zaidi's Pulitzer?
Eric Walberg
Cold War Shivers
Norm Kent
What Will Obama Do About Marijuana?
Stephen Martin
Reasons for Cheerfulness
Worthy Group of the Day
Collateral Repair Project
December 23, 2008
Michael Hudson
The Ponzi Paradigm
Michael Yates
The Tombstone Economy
Chuck Spinney
The New York Times Flames Out in Defense Dogfight
Vijay Prashad
India's Reckless Road to Washington, Through Tel Aviv
Brian Horejsi
Interior Decorating: Obama, Salazar and the Future of America's Public Lands
David Macaray
Obama's Best Pick?
Neil Watkins /
Sarah Anderson
Ecuador's Conscientious Default
David Michael Green
Hey, Reagan Democrats! Now Do You Get It?
Worthy Group of the Day
Focus on the Corporation
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Weekend Edition
January 16-18, 2009
Jerry Williams' Lost Classic
An Album That Lives Up to Its Cover
By LORENZO WOLFF
It’s funny how much an album cover matters. In the world of the digital download, the cover of an old LP found at a junk store can make an enormous impact. I stumbled across a record like this a couple years ago, a gorgeous Pedro Bell-style album cover featuring a giant purple hand on the front with a spider’s face replacing the middle finger and doodles of everything from helicopters to rhinoceroses on the back. I dug deep into my pockets and coughed up the 50 cents that the storeowner was asking and promptly dumped the LP in one of the many milk crates that litter my apartment.
Months later organizing my records (It’s not habit-forming, I promise, I can quit anytime I want), I found that same record and put it on the platter for the same reason that I bought it. Bracing myself for disappointment, I watched robot arm of the needle hit the wax and was immediately captivated. Tighter than tight drums punch in a funky groove and a bass that could only be played by Ed Watkins sounds so purposeful it’s hard to listen to anything else. And those horns. Those fucking horns come in like Memphis in 1965. Meanwhile, the singer sounds like Stevie Wonder would have if the eighties had never hit. The voice has got all the controlled openness and generosity of emotion that so many people try and fail to imitate.
Turns out the record is called Gone and it’s by a guy named Jerry Williams. A quick background search shows that Williams had been playing for a long time before Gone came out. At the tender age of sixteen he began his career by playing rhythm guitar for Little Richard, where the lead guitar player, one Jimmy James (who would soon change his last name to Hendrix) served as a mentor and advisor. After the authorities found out about his age, Williams was forced to leave the Little Richard tour and founded his own band, the Top Beats. When the Top Beats were less than successful and a solo record failed, Williams spent a few years working at a dairy farm. It would be nearly five years before he tried again.
In 1979 Williams released Gone and it is aptly named. Serious disagreements with Warner Brothers immediately after its release meant that the recording would never be as widely accepted as Williams had hoped. Today Gone is virtually unknown. Even so, one glance at the credits and it’s obvious that the cuts were made in the promotion, not the production. The liner notes could serve as a who’s who of late seventies session musicians, not to mention the historic figures. It’s the only album that both of the great pioneers of electric bass, James Jamerson and Donald “Duck” Dunn, appear on together. But even with all of these big names, Gone still sounds like one voice. There’s a continuity that flows between all of the songs, even the ones not penned by Williams himself. This is about as close to perfect as you can get and still have enough flaws to be human.
Records like this one are what make those milk crates in my apartment important. That urge to search junk stores can’t be just a twisted obsession if discoveries like Gone can come from it. And I can honestly say that just this once, I’m glad that I judged a book by its cover.
Lorenzo Wolff is a musician living in New York. He can be reached at: lorenzowolff@gmail.com
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