Tag Archives: America

Iran VIII Part One: The War

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Iran VIII Part One: The War
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Hey folks—

It’s explained in the show, but the tortured titling here comes from that I promised the last Iran show this week, and in what’s to me the most important sense, I delivered. It’s written, recorded, edited, all that. It’s just not up on the site. WordPress and my podcasting plugin don’t play too hot with massive files, and if I hadn’t cut this up, it’d be closing on 4 hours and much too large. So today we’ve got part one and a week from now we’ll have part two, with the show I did with Rob last Thursday after that and then who knows.

Down to business. We don’t have a whole lot of new characters to break in this show, if you can believe that, and the couple I ought to bring up will have a bigger showing next week, and I’ll leave them til then. But there’s still a war on, and what we need for that are maps.

Here we’ve got the map that I used the most in the production of this episode. All the important details are there. The relative size of our two combatants, with the full expanse of Iran revealed for once. You’ve got Turkey up in the northwest, Afghanistan and Pakistan and the USSR bordering Iran, with some idea of the politics and tensions that will grow up there as the Soviets invade Afghanistan in the 1980s. You’ve got the other Arab Gulf States nestled up against Iraq, the country they’ll be so doggedly supplying and aiding through the long eight years of this war. And you’ve got the Zagros Mountains, something that helps to explain at least in part why Saddam had such a hard time advancing beyond those little pink areas.

Continue reading Iran VIII Part One: The War →

Lying in Politics

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Lying in Politics
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Not a whole lot of news this time out. The title of the post is obviously drawn from the essay in Hannah Arendt’s Crises of the Republic.

Which we should all read, but if the point of this show is that politicians stopped believing the American public capable of argument and then dumbed us down to the point that we actually became incapable of argument, then I guess the point is also that as a rule, we don’t read Arendt or anything else that might explain what’s going wrong at the heart of us.

Happy Monday, folks!

The Plan for Mexico

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The Plan for Mexico
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Hey Everybody,

This Monday’s show is short and to the point. Next Monday, we’re back to Iran. You might be able to hear in this one that I’m a little sick. The unfortunate side-effect of having a weekly show where I talk is that, well, if I get sick I’ve still gotta record. I’m going to try to get as well as I can before I hammer Iran, but I’ve got to get in the booth soon or there’s no way I’ll have time to finish editing this week.

The “booth”

Remember, SFD needs your help to grow and survive. That means sharing us on Facebook, means following us on Twitter, it means going out and rating the show, and above all, just spreading the word-of-mouth. It’s up to you folks.

And SFD’s new Patreon-exclusive news show is up, this time talking about trade agreements, NAFTA, and the tax reform plan going to the Congress. It turned out pretty tight and it’s worth a look-hear.

The End of the World—A Conversation with Rob Morris

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The End of the World—A Conversation with Rob Morris
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Hey Everybody—

Like I said up on the FB page on Monday, I wasn’t skipping this week, I just had a date with Rob Morris yesterday. Short show notes, but remember:

Rate and review the show on iTunes, Stitcher, or whatever else you use.

An earthquake hit Mexico yesterday and it’s looking not too good. If you’ve got bills to sling around on relief, think about sending a few down here.

I’ve got a piece up on the Awl.com about how Ancient Aliens from the History Channel is the most dangerous show on TV.

And with September’s news show going up next week or the last in the month, remember to check out our Patreon.

SFD Short—Bad Patriotism

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SFD Short—Bad Patriotism
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I’ve been thinking about patriotism in the US for a long time, long enough to have written this for the College Dems’ newspaper back at Georgetown. There’s something about how everybody wants to be a patriot without ever considering what the term might really mean; something about the way it is, for us, tied up with the State and the Military (it was no accident that we broke out Patriot missiles and the Patriot Act in the wake of 9/11); and something about how the Right in the US today has latched rabidly onto the term that all make me pretty uncomfortable.

These are, undoubtedly, self-described American patriots. And especially when I wrote this episode, over the weekend of the Charlottesville White Right march and murder, it seemed as though my discomfort was getting more and more relevant.

All of these guys would call themselves patriots. And the word ‘patriot’ itself seems to give them an excuse to ignore any self-analysis, like the way the 82nd Airborne were a not insignificant part of the Allied war effort against the Axis powers. It’s telling that the minutemen are the only part of the Revolution they remember and the only iconography they include in their self-image when in fact the real firepower of the Founding Fathers, the stuff that made our little uprising stick where a thousand others didn’t, happened not in the field but in scenes like this:

And finally, for reasons that probably won’t become clear until the end of the episode, here’s this the Ballet Amalia Hernandez doing what’s popularly known as the Mexican Hat Dance, to the “Jarabe Tapatío:”

I’ve got that video start to set when the Jarabe does, but if you want to lay eyes on some of the dances you might see to “Guadalajara” or to the “Son de la Negra,” which ends the episode, go ahead and rewind it and you will. Here are the three kids who played “Maria Chuchena,” the huapango music from where I used to live in the Sierra Gorda, in Querétaro.

I couldn’t tell you who Camila Cabello is from Eve, but apparently she’s popular in Mexico along with the US.  I’ve got her in here because I think it’s a pretty apt example of how “Mexico Lindo y Querido” is always welcome, even at some teeny-bop pop concert.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yKNBU_BMCkg

But here’s Vicente Fernandez, Chente, doing it right:

SFD Short—Ends and Means

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SFD Short—Ends and Means
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Well, this is the tenth short, which means we’re putting out a helluva lot more content this year than last, and I hope that’s to the good.

Our very first Patreon-exclusive news analysis show is going up this week, so head to our page to check out the details. Otherwise, share this show, man. You can get the post I’ll be putting up at SFD’s Facebook page or you can write your own, for whatever network.

That lady up there, by the way, is Hannah Arendt, and if, God willing, some future person ever writes about me as an intellectual, they’ll be listing her as my ‘spiritual mentor.’

Musical credit goes to Kai Engel again, this time for his album caeli.

SFD Short—Death of the Republic

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SFD Short—Death of the Republic
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Hey everybody, so two things I’ve mentioned coming to fruition this week. First, I’m gonna be having another conversation with Rob Morris of the More Freedom Foundation like the one we did a few weeks ago. That is, if I can find a library study room around here where I’m in Tennessee for a family reunion. This’ll go down on Thursday afternoon, and I’ll let you know on Facebook when  it’s imminent. Get on while we’re doing it live to give us questions or comments, and leave them here or on the Face beforehand and we’ll get to them on Thursday.

The second thing is that we’ve now got a Patreon page at which you can support SFD! Namely, you can sign up to give me regular and very small amounts of cash every time I put up a show. Everybody wins.

Alright, this is about norms and the death of democracy. Enjoy, folks.

SFD Short—Alternate Realities

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SFD Short—Alternate Realities
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“Well, now that we have seen each other,” said the Unicorn, “if you’ll believe in me, I’ll believe in you.”

—Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking-Glass

Another SFD short brought to you already by SFD.

I’m going to be starting up a Patreon, probably sometime next week, and when I do, for the first thirty days, signing up with me will result in Patreon sending bonus cash to Robert Morris, the guy I talked to the other week.

So when I get on that, think about signing up for a buck a show so that I can keep making this podcast and keep eating beans and corn and, sometimes, squash.

Also chiles and corn fungus
Tried and true!

Keeping these brief, enjoy the show, tell your friends.

Blog, Day by Day

Sick of Sin

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Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs,
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots,
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of gas-shells dropping softly behind.
 
Gas! GAS! Quick, boys!—An ecstasy of fumbling
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time,
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And flound’ring like a man in fire or lime.—
Dim through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
 
In all my dreams before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.
 
If in some smothering dreams, you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil’s sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,—
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.
 
—Wilfred Owen, Dulce et Decorum Est

 Giving It Up (Kind Of)

A couple of announcements here at the top. The blog’s going to be on hiatus for a few weeks, because I’m traveling around Mexico for Semana Santa and a little reporting. After I get back, though, I’m going to put a pin in the regular Monday roundups. They’re draining, especially in terms of the unremunerated time that I’d otherwise be putting towards the podcast, and I’m not really seeing the numbers that would support keeping them up. So I’m going to keep this one brief, and I’ll only get back into it if something really strikes me as both important and not being covered elsewhere.

And in the unlikely event that you were relying on SFD for a roundup, then Doug Muder at the Weekly Sift and the guys at Crooked Media are your best options. Pod Save America will give you as much as you can handle twice a week, and I think Lovett or Leave It might be the best audio anything anywhere.

Aside from these Monday things, I’m going to really drill down on the next Iran shows, and that usually results in a blog or two. And I’m going to be trying some other, shorter-format podcast things, so the site’ll be active going forward.

Continue reading Sick of Sin →

Blog, Day by Day

Goethe’s Oak

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I’m running a day late this week, mostly due to hangover, but I’ve got an excuse. This was a three day weekend in Mexico, commemorating the birthday of what wasn’t their first president, or even their first republican president, but what was, because of a messy political century from 1820 to 1920 or so, their first real republican, democratic president, and the first indigenous president elected anywhere in Latin America.

Viva Juarez.

Another EO

We only got one real new executive order last week. The new travel ban was actually written two weeks ago, and since it was stopped by a federal court as soon as it was supposed to go into effect, until the next wrinkle on that shakes out, the one worth paying attention to is EO 13781, the “Comprehensive Plan for Reorganizing the Executive Branch.”

The EO, on its face, appears to be pretty tame, and definitely to appeal to the folks who got POTUS elected. It directs the Director of the Office of Management and Budget, who puts together the budget for the executive branch, to:

…submit to the President a proposed plan to reorganize the executive branch in order to improve the efficiency, effectiveness, and accountability of agencies. The proposed plan shall include, as appropriate, recommendations to eliminate unnecessary agencies, components of agencies, and agency programs, and to merge functions. The proposed plan shall include recommendations for any legislation or administrative measures necessary to achieve the proposed reorganization.

 

Continue reading Goethe’s Oak →