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Today's
Stories
December 5 / 7, 2008
Alexander Cockburn
Honeymoans From the Left
Brian Cloughley
Shambles in Afghanistan
Paul Craig Roberts
Muslim Revolution: How Washington Arrogance Helped Drive the Mumbai Attacks
Liaquat Ali Khan
Mumbai and the Kashmir Tinderbox
Farzana Versey
Mumbai's Charge of the Lightweight Brigade
Peter Lee
Pakistan Nears the Breaking Point
Peter Morici
Slouching Toward a Depression?
Yinon Cohen /
Neve Gordon
Obama Could End the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict: Will He Meet the Challenge?
Johnny Barber
Aswad's Story:
Illegal Detention and the Declaration of Human Rights
Alan Farago
Fallout from the Pass-Through Economy
Jeremy Scahill
Obama Doesn't Plan to End Occupation of Iraq
Mike Whitney
Powergrab in Ottawa
Carl Finamore
Thank God I'm an Atheist! (Or Boy is Bill O'Reilly in for a Big Surprise)
Marjorie Cohn
Obama and Women's Rights
Norm Kent
Tommy Chong, the Unanticipated Warrior
Binoy Kampmark
Committing Suicide On-Line: the Briggs Case
David Yearsley
Thematics From the Golden Past
December 4, 2008
Ece Temelkuran
Inside the Ergenekon Case
Ralph Nader
Turning Crisis into Opportunity: Who Will Seize the Moment?
Harry Browne
The Bush-Obama National Security Strategy
Eamonn Fingleton
The American Car Industry: a Riposte to the Knockers
Conn Hallinan
The Syria Attack
Mike Whitney
Fiasco in Somalia: Another CIA Cock-Up
Stewart J. Lawrence
Obama and Latinos: Richardson, Alone, is Not Enough
Paul Fitzgerald /
Elizabeth Gould
Message to Obama: Stop Killing Afghanis
Karyn Strickler
Show Us the Green, Before We Show You the Money
Jennifer Matsui
Obama-Cola: the Great National Temperance Beverage
Website of the Day
"He Ain't Got Laid in a Month of Sundays..."
December 3, 2008
Andrew Cockburn
What's Wrong with the U.S. Military
Sheldon Rampton
Mormon Homophobia: Up Close and Personal
Robert Weissman
Nationalize GM
Yifat Susskind
From Mumbai to Washington
William Blum
The Obama Bummer:
Vote First, Ask Questions Later
Alan Singer
The Ghost of the Defunct Economist
David Macaray
Trampled Under Foot at Wal-Mart
Martha Rosenberg
Born With a Statin Deficiency? Line Forms to the Left!
Mats Svensson
The Crimes Have No Period of Limitations
Website of the Day
Why Bill Richardson's Nomination Should be Opposed
December 2, 2008
Jeremy Scahill
Obama's Kettle of Hawks
Paul Craig Roberts
The New Arms Race
Ayesha Ijaz Khan
The Mumbai Terror Attacks: Is Pakistan to Blame?
Sarah Anderson /
John Cavanagh
Skewed Priorities: How the Bailout Dwarfs Spending on Other Global Crises
William Blum
The Mythology of the War on Terrorism
John Ross
Mexico's Drug War Goes Down in Flames
Dave Lindorff
A Tale of Two Terror Attacks
Nicola Nasser
A Peace Process That Makes Peace Impossible
Steve Conn
Operation Redskin Removal
Robert Bryce
Coal Hard Facts
Website of the Day
Country, Funk, Soul
December 1, 2008
Patrick Cockburn
From Baghdad to Mumbai, by Way of Pakistan
Damien Millet /
Eric Toussaint
Obama's Economic Team:
Records of Failure
Vijay Prashad
The Fires in South Asia
Deepak Tripathi
Obama's Foreign Crises
Joshua Frank
Madam Secretary Clinton and the Middle East
P. Sainath
The Unlikely Martyrdom of Free Market Jihad
Alan Farago
The Right's War on Regulators
Binoy Kampmark
Sydney's Ball and Chain
Chris Genovali
Silent Fall
David Michael Green
Hope You Die Before You Get Old
Stephen Martin
The Chinese are Coming, the Chinese are Coming!
Website of the Day
Robert Rubin: Coward, Liar or Both?
November 28-30, 2008
Alexander Cockburn
In Time of Trouble
Mike Whitney
The Obama "Dream Team": Rubin Clones and Other Fakers
Ted Honderich
What is the Meaning of Obama's Election?
Tom Kerr
Preserving Filthy Lucre (Or Becoming My Dad)
Mike Ely
The Conquest of New England
David Yearsley
Hymns of the Conquest
Deepak Tripathi
Uproar in Police-State Britain
Sonja Karkar
Gaza's Death Throes
Ramzy Baroud
Salvation in a News Broadcast
Robert Weitzel
Israel's Settlement on Capitol Hill
Robert Roth
Can We Create a Movement for Change?
Carlos Fierro
Obama and the End of Racism?
David Macaray
How to Kill a Union
David Rosen
A New Sexual Agenda
James Cockcroft
Indigenous People Rising
Stan Cox
The Most Disappointing Gift
Steve Conn
Talking Turkey About College Basketball
Stephen Martin
The Electromagnetic Pulse and Economic Warfare
Richard Rhames
Busty Bimbettes, Bombs and Brand Obama
Kim Nicolini
Women as Products and Cannibalistic Achievers
Lorenzo Wolff
A Battle Cry for the Confused and Vulnerable
Poets' Basement
Woods, Harrison and Corseri
November 27, 2008
Tariq Ali
The Assault on Mumbai
Steve Hendricks
Thanksgiving We Can Believe In: Justice in Indian Country
Ralph Nader
Open Up Those Corporate Tax Returns
John Walsh
The Root Cause of the Crisis of 2008
Dave Lindorff
The Department of Homeland Lunacy
Christopher Brauchli
Thanks A Lot, Mr. Meese: How Alberto Gonzales Learned to Get You to Pay for His Legal Bills
Matthew Koehler
Giving Thanks for Burned Forests
Website of the Day
John Trudell: "Crazy Horse We Hear What You Say"
November 26, 2008
Michael Hudson
The Obama Letdown
Alan Farago
Bailouts and the New Math
Stanley Heller
Don't Bail Them Out, Take Them Over
Kevin Zeese
The Real Cost of the Bailout
Steve Conn
Now It Can Be Told (Except in North Carolina)
Ray McGovern
Kafka and Uighurs at Guantánamo
Ron Jacobs
King George is Gone: Now It's Time to Organize
Eric Walberg
Obama's Odious Entourage
Martha Rosenberg
Pay No Attention to That Turkey Being Slaughtered (Or How Sarah Palin Created a Whole New Generation of Vegetarians)
Matt Siegfried
Back to the Future With Barack
Website of the Day
"Every Time I've Compromised, I've Lost"
November 25, 2008
James Abourezk
Of Arrogance, Bailouts and the Big Three
Ralph Nader
Don't Suppress Carter
Patrick Irelan
PBS Reports for Big Oil on Venezuela
John Ross
Obama in Bedlam
Fred Gardner
Dr. Goodwin and the Infinite Con
Dan LaBotz
The Auto Crisis: a Big Caravan to Washington?
Tom Barry
Napolitano and Immigration Policy
Norman Solomon
The Ideology of No Ideology
Richard Morse
Memo From Haiti:
Where the Culture of Corruption Meets the Corruption of Culture
Chris Strohm
The Missing Rules of Engagement in Cyberwar
Website of the Day
Green vs. Green?
November 24, 2008
Mike Whitney
You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet
Pam Martens
The Rise and Fall of Citigroup
Laray Polk
Bush's Library: the Kurds, Oil and Missing Records
David Ker Thomson
American Friends: With Friends Like These, Who Needs Canadians?
Uri Avnery
Likud Rising
Joe Mowrey
Deprivation and Desperation in Gaza
Ramzi Kysia
An Administration in Search of a Progressive:
the Team Obama Should Have Picked
Kevin Zeese
The Causes of the Auto Crisis
Dave Lindorff
Rescuing the Blob:
Idiots and Bailouts
David Macaray
Seven Reasons You Should Join a Union
Howard Lisnoff
Inaugurations Past and Present
Website of the Day
I Hate the Beatles
November 21 / 23, 2008
Alexander Cockburn
The Honeymoon is Looking a Bit Wan
Michael Hudson
Paulson's Cascade of Lies
Mike Whitney
Time to Move to Plan B ... If There is One
Barbara Rose Johnston /
Holly M. Barker
Cautionary Tales From a Nuclear War Zone
Serge Halimi
The Gloom of Empire: Downhill All the Way
Alan Farago
The Suburbs March On
Ralph Nader
Changing With Retreads: the Third Clinton Administration
Saul Landau
When Old Axioms Don't Apply
Robert Bryce
From LBJ to Obama: the End of Texas Dominance
Shannon May
Ecological Crisis and Eco-Villages in China
Binoy Kampmark
The End of the Yugo
Jack Ely
The Fate of the West's Wild Horses
Ramzy Baroud
The Rights of Women in War Zones
Missy Beattie
Why Vote, Anyway?
Larry Portis
Women Soldiers Serving in (and Barely Surviving) the Israeli Army
James McEnteer
Colombia's Laboratory of Failure
Christopher Brauchli
A Tale of Two Whales
David Yearsley
Real
Swords, Fire and Don Giovanni
Adam Engel
Power Down
Ron Jacobs
The Continuing Saga of the White Album
Lorenzo Wolff
Honky Tonk Heroes:
When Country Got Real
Poets' Basement
Raza Ali Hasan
Website of the Weekend
Lips and Fingers
November 20, 2008
P. Sainath
The Jurassic Auto and Idea Park
Brian McKenna
How Dow Chemical Defies Homeland Security and Risks Another 9/11
Paul Craig Roberts
What Uncle Sam Has to Say to His Creditors
Andy Worthington
How Guanántamo Can be Closed
Peter Lee
India Doubles Down in Afghanistan ... Maybe
Dr. Eyad al-Serraj
At the Erez Crossing
Sen. Russ Feingold
The Bush Pardons
Lance Selfa
Who Made the New Deal?
Ray McGovern
Keeping Gates
Benjamin G. Davis
Ending Torture; Prosecuting the Torturers
Tracy McLellan
Obama's Crony Democracy: the Return of Tom Daschle
Website of the Day
Finally, a Victory for Palestinians
November 19, 2008
M. Shahid Alam
Obama and the Politics of Race and Religion in America
Mario A. Murillo
Holder, Chiquita and Colombian Death Squads
Martine Boulard
Escaping the Dollar's Shadow
Robin D. G. Kelley
Will Obama be the First "Freedom" Democrat?
Behrooz Ghamari-Tabrizi
Obama and the Iron Cage
Jonathan Cook
Who Will Stop the Settlers?
Steve Conn
Spare Change or No Change at All
George Wuerthner
The NYT and the Beetles of Mass Destruction
Michael Winship
This Just in From Middle Earth
Stephen Martin
The Other Side of the Pleasure-Dome
Website of the Day
An Important Holiday Message From Kristen Johnston
November 18, 2008
Chellis Glendinning
Cheering for Morgan Stanley
George C. Wilson
Perils of Pakistan: Will It Prove to be Obama's Cambodia?
Franklin Lamb
Who Will Evict Israel from Lebanon: Hezbollah or the UN?
Bill and Kathleen Christison
The Irresponsibility of Appointing Hillary Clinton Secretary of State
Roger Burbach
Orchestrating a Civic Coup in Bolivia: How Bush Tried to Bring Down Morales
John Ross
Drilling vs. Direct Democracy in Mexico
Wajahat Ali
Is Obama the Muslim World's Superman?
Damien Millet /
Eric Toussaint
What Really Happened in Washington? The G20 and the Inconsistent Script
Marc Gardner
When Mooning is a Sex Crime
Eric Walberg
Courting the Bear: a New Era for Russian/Western Relations?
Wendy Williams
The Bottled Water Con
Website of the Day
Where's Zappa When We Need Him?
November 17, 2008
Michael Hudson
Bankers Shake Down Congress and the G-20
Paul Craig Roberts
When It's a Clear Day and You Can't See GM
Mike Whitney
Busted in Washington
Steve Conn
Where is Nader Country 2008? Mapping the Nader Votes
Andy Worthington
Closing Guantánamo: Advice for Obama
Jonathan Cook
The Real Goal of Israel's Blockade of Gaza: "They Are All Hamas"
Rannie Amiri
Dual Loyalties Will Doom Obama
David Macaray
Bailing Out the Automakers
David Michael Green
Twelve Victories
Charles Modiano
Sports Illustrated and Sexism: Tokenism or a New Day?
Website of the Day
The South Sea Bubble
November 14 / 16, 2008
Alexander Cockburn
Heading for the First Hundred Days
Jeffrey St. Clair
How Bill Clinton Doomed the Spotted Owl: a Cautionary Tale for Greens in the Age of Obama
Mike Whitney
Paulson the Bungler
Sasan Fayazmanesh
RIP: the Experts, 1929-2008
Moshe Adler
Keynes:
China's Greatest Export?
Anthony DiMaggio
Transcending Race?
Jean Bricmont
Cats, Dogs and Creationism
Sheldon Rampton
The Eisenstadt Hoax: a Real Life Example of a "Fake Fake"
Douglas Valentine
Let the Trials Begin!
Joseph Nevins /
Timothy Dunn
Barricading the Border
Tom Barry
Rahm Emanuel's Political Pragmatism on Immigration
Ron Jacobs
Che Guevara Meets Trashman: the Genius of Spain Rodriguez
Larry Portis
The State of the Israeli State
Mary Lynn Cramer Obama's Brain Trust: Seems Like Old Times
Sherry Wolf
The Myth of the Black/Gay Divide
Peter Cervantes-Gautschi
Secretary of Greed: How Larry Summers Championed Wall Street by Impoverishing the Mexican People
Jacob Hornberger
The Conservative Malaise: Hey, Brother, Can You Spare Some Habeas Corpus?
Lance Selfa
The Center-Right Nation Con
Benjamin Dangl
Vermont Against General Dynamics
Seth Sandronsky
Lifelines in Hard Times
Russell Mokhiber
Time to Give the Friends of Big Coal the Boot
Allan Stellar
Nuke a Gay Whale for the Navy
Kelly Overton
Get Thee to a Shelter:
the Obamas and the Million-Mutt March
Martha Rosenberg
Why Mink are Cheering the Economic Crisis
Richard Rhames
Palling Around with Ray the Plumber
David Yearsley
How I Played Hooky from "High School Musical 3"
Lorenzo Wolff
Zach is Back: Songs of Hurt, Rage and Resistance
Poets' Basement
Gibbons, Ford and Buknatski
Website of the Weekend
The Eyes Have It
November 13, 2008
Pam Martens
The Two Trillion DollarBlack Hole
Vijay Prashad
Guilt by Participation: Sonal Shah's Membership Has Expired
Patrick Cockburn
Who is Paying for the Iraqi National Intelligence Service?
Jonathan Cook
The Withering Palestinian Economy
Ralph Nader
Obama and the Rogue Regime
Bill Quigley
McCain Owes America an Apology
Lee Sustar
Bailing Out the Big Three
Omar Barghouti
Boycotting Israeli Settlement Products
Steve Conn
More Alaska Fun
Howard Lisnoff
The Last Bastion of Hate
Jeff Cohen
What Indy Media Heroes Can Teach Us
Website of the Day
Who are the Obamagelicals?
November 12, 2008
Johanna Berrigan
Scattered Families: the Iraq Refugee Crisis
Steve Conn
The Big Mystery Election in Alaska
Patrick Bond
Against Volcker
Bokar Ture /
Dedrick Muhammad
Remembering a Black Radical in a Barack Obama America
Alan Farago
The Hispanic Vote in South Florida: Not Dyed Blue Yet
Dave Lindorff
Rescuing Joe Lieberman
Karl Grossman
Break Up Big Oil: Tyranny in the Tank
David Macaray
An Obama Litmus Test: Will Labor Have a Seat at the Table?
George Wuerthner
Act Now to Save America's Public Forests
Susie Day
Heavy Weather
Website of the Day
Does the Planet Have a Future? an Interview with Derrick Jensen
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Weekend Edition
December 5 / 7, 2008
The Pogues' "Rum, Sodomy and the Lash "
Troubled Songs of Home and War
By LORENZO WOLFF
I used to work at a vintage guitar store, and I learned to be able to tell the difference between American made guitars and their Japanese and Chinese knock-offs. Sure the contours were the same, and the lacquer looked pretty similar, but there is something about a Gibson that sounds and feels very different from an Epiphone. The Pogues prove that music is the same way. They’re the kind of band whose roots show in everything they do. Not because they sing about their home, or because they use traditional Irish instrumentation, but because the emotion their music portrays sounds like the world from which they emerged.
In 1985 Ireland was almost twenty years deep into the Troubles. Constant protest and upheaval had made northern Ireland a battleground, and the whole country was suffering. The Pogues released Rum, Sodomy and the Lash amid this confusion and devastation, as an honest portrayal of how it felt to be in the Irish working class during all this deadly strife. You can hear it in songs like “The Old Main Drag”, the story of a young man living on the street after moving to a cruel city, or it’s counterpart “Sally Maclennane”, which evokes the lives of the people who stay at home. “Dirty Old  Town” sketches the experience of growing up and then dying in the same town, and the closeness between nostalgia and regret.
For the most part, the songs on Rum, Sodomy and the Lash can be divided into two categories, songs about home and songs about war. What could be more appropriate knowing Ireland’s political situation? Up-tempo romps like “Gentleman Soldier” or “Billy’s Bones” try to make horrible situations easier, by using humor, but by the last song all of the pleasantries have been extinquished. “The Band Played Waltzing Matilda”, originally by Eric Bogle, starts with just a banjo and Shane McGowan’s despondent vocals. You begin to piece together the story of a young carefree man who’s drafted into the Australian army to fight in the Battle Of Gallipoli. After weeks in the trenches he’s hit by a Turkish shell and loses his legs. It’s not just a physical wound, however, his whole outlook is changed:
As our ship pulled into circular quay,
I looked at the place where my legs used to be,
And thanked Christ there was nobody waiting for me,
To grieve and to mourn and to pity.
Time passes and the last image we have of him is as an old man, sitting on his porch watching the ANZAC parades:
I see the old men, all twisted and torn,
The forgotten heroes of a forgotten war,
And the young people ask me what are they marching for,
And I ask myself the same question
While Eric Bogle wrote the song to be about the veterans of the First World War, the Pogues have made it distinctly Irish. It’s impossible to hear this song without thinking of the Troubles, and the people who lived through them. So critics will say the lacquer is faded or the contours are off, but you can’t argue that this album isn’t authentic.
Lorenzo Wolff is a musician living in New York. He can be reached at: lorenzowolff@gmail.com
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