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Saturday, June 18, 2005
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Very nice piece in today's San Francisco Chronicle on Ry Cooder by Joel Selvin, covering his new album and career. I put Paradise and Lunch, one of my favorite albums of all time on this morning, and listened loud. Amazon shipped the new album to me the other day and I was anxiously looking at the window all day watching for the UPS truck. But, alas, it hasn't come yet. Funny thing about that Paradise and Lunch album: I don't remember the last time I listened to it, probably only once or twice in the last year, but I played it so heavily when it came out, back in the early 70s, that I still know every lyric, every note on it. I first saw Ry Cooder live shortly before the album appeared, and he did a lot of songs from it, and the wonderful Into the Purple Valley, too. If you don't know this stuff, it's highly, highly recommended, and the Amazon samples give you a taste of it.
5:41:24 PM 
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I have no way of evaluating the truth of this story about U.S. dead in Iraq, but certainly it's not impossible to believe.
There is excellent reason to believe that the Department of Defense is deliberately not reporting a significant number of the dead in Iraq. We have received copies of manifests from the MATS that show far more bodies shipped into Dover AFP than are reported officially. The educated rumor is that the actual death toll is in excess of 7,000. Given the officially acknowledged number of over 15,000 seriously wounded, this elevated death toll is far more realistic than the current 1,400+ now being officially published. When our research is complete, and watertight, we will publish the results along with the sources In addition to the evident falsification of the death rolls, at least 5,500 American military personnel have deserted, most in Ireland but more have escaped to Canada and other European countries, none of whom are inclined to cooperate with vengeful American authorities. (See TBR News of 18 February for full coverage on the mass desertions) This means that of the 158,000 U.S. military shipped to Iraq, 26,000 either deserted, were killed or seriously wounded. The DoD lists currently being very quietly circulated indicate almost 9,000 dead, over 16,000 seriously wounded and a large number of suicides, forced hospitalization for ongoing drug usage and sales, murder of Iraqi civilians and fellow soldiers , rapes, courts martial and so on
Via http://liberalavenger.com/
4:58:53 PM
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In John Crowley's imagining, Byron's lost novel is both a Gothic extravaganza and a picaresque adventure.
(Via The New York Times > Books.)
Just requested from my library; a new Crowley is always an event!
1:43:12 PM
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© Copyright 2005 Steve Michel.
Last update: 7/2/2005; 2:39:35 PM.
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