Chile's Earthquake: How To Help

The New York Times reports:

A strong aftershock struck Chile on Sunday, a day after a destructive 8.8-magnitude earthquake left hundreds of people dead and a long swath of the country in smoky rubble.

The death toll was expected to rise, particularly around Concepción, Chile's second-largest metropolitan area, which is roughly 70 miles from the quake's center. The aftershock was reported around 8:30 local time Sunday morning from the capital of Santiago, where it shook buildings, according to Reuters.

More than 1.5 million people have displaced by the quake, according to local news services that quoted the director of Chile's emergency management office. In Concepción, which appeared to be especially hard hit, the mayor said Sunday morning that 100 people were trapped under the rubble of a building that had collapsed, according to Reuters.

Elsewhere in Concepción, cars lay mangled and upended on streets littered with telephone wires and power cables. A new 14-story apartment building fell, while an older, biochemical lab at the University of Concepción caught fire.

In other words, what Chilean President Michele Bachelet called a "catastrophe."

Time, again, to get out the checkbook. Remember that this is the internet. Heroics aren't required, just lots of people giving small amounts.

The Nation let's us know how to help:

Save The Children -- Save The Children is sending an emergency assessment team to Chile, and is asking for contributions to its Children's Emergency Fund to aid these efforts.

World Vision -- The international development, relief and advocacy organization has already sent its first relief flight, from Bolivia this afternoon, with supplies like tarps, blankets, plastic sheeting, and collapsible water containers for survivors. Support these efforts with earmarked gifts to families that need them.

AmeriCares -- Vice President of Emergency Response, Christoph Gorder, says AmeriCares is sending medical supplies and humanitarian aid to Chile. Make a direct contribution to AmeriCares' Chilean earthquake fund.

Habitat for Humanity -- Habitat for Humanity has a continual presence in Chile, where the group has constructed more than 1,300 homes. Habitat will be essential in reconstruction efforts, especially in hard-hit rural areas.

International Medical Corps -- IMC has a presence in dozens of countries around the globe, providing immediate medical care to those affected by natural disasters. Contribute to its emergency response fund.

ShelterBox -- International disaster relief agency ShelterBox has mobilized a team to bring aid to Concepcion, Chile's second largest city, which saw the worse damage.

There are other groups I like to support I have not listed here. I will update this later to add them. Also, I have some antipathy to some of the groups here, particularly World Vision, because of their proselytizing activities to indigenous people in the high Andes, but right now I think the primary idea is to get aid on the ground.

NYSEG: Please Help Out My Neighbors

Seems that the electricity around here-- not mine-- has been off for a day or so and that NYSEG doesn't know when it's going to come back on. If my neighbors dial NYSEG's wonderful 800 outage number, something of a ritual in these parts, they can get only a recording. It says (paraphrasing), "Yes, your power is out. Neighbors' too. No, we don't know how long it will be."

Hard to believe it's 2010 when this is going on. The backroads look like something out of Little House on the Prairie.

The Beginning Of Demanding That Promises Be Kept

When Will The Killer Of Brad Will Be Brought To Justice?

The New York Times today reports that the person held by Oaxaca authorities-- a person who clearly was not involved in the crime-- for the murder of Brad Wills in 2006 has finally been released from custody. That means that the investigation of the murder will now go back to the AG's office. But is it too late, has too much time been wasted for the real murderer to be brought to justice? Has this distraction been the end of the "investigation"?

The Times reports:

The man accused of killing a New York City journalist as he videotaped street clashes in Oaxaca in 2006 was released from jail on Thursday after an appeals tribunal declared that there was no evidence against him.

The ruling was congruent with what the victim’s family and human rights groups have long asserted, that the journalist, Bradley Roland Will, was not shot at close range by an antigovernment protester as the government has maintained.

But the decision now leaves the case open, more than three years after Mr. Will was shot...

Under Mexican law, the investigation goes back to the attorney general’s office, said Miguel Ángel de los Santos, a Mexican lawyer for the Will family. “Until now there hasn’t been any proof,” he said. “What we hope is that they open other lines of investigation.”

The attorney general’s office said Thursday night that it had no comment on the release of the suspect or whether it would pursue further action in the case.

So who was it that the authorities held? And what, if anything, was his connection with the case? Or was he just somebody to hold so the real killers might remain hidden and any trail might grow cold?

The suspect, Juan Manuel Martínez Moreno, a baker and an activist with the coalition opposed to Gov. Ulises Ruiz, was arrested 18 months ago and accused of shooting Mr. Will at close range.

But photos and video of the scene show armed men, believed to government-backed agents, firing into the crowd of demonstrators from a distance. That account has been confirmed by other journalists who were with Mr. Will when he was killed on Oct. 27, 2006. A review of the forensic evidence by Physicians for Human Rights also found that the bullet had probably not been fired at close range.

Although Mr. Martínez took part in the protests, there was no evidence placing him at the scene of the shooting, human rights groups said. Nor, they said, did the government explain why Mr. Martínez would want to kill Mr. Will, who was sympathetic to the protesters’ cause.

The way this murder investigation has been handled is just disgraceful.

Saving The Tiger: First Steps

Tigers are on the brink of extinction. This fact brought me initially surprise, and then immediately grief, despair, rage, anger and sadness. So, I've written about it-- this is the fourth essay in a week -- in an effort to alert others to this catastrophe. I consider the extinction of tigers and other big cats an environmental emergency, an impending disaster.

The first big cat extinction since the saber tooth tiger became extinct 10,000 years ago is an extremely important event and a cause for great concern. Tigers are the top of the jungle food chain. They're "megafauna", the kind of big, well known animal that is an indicator of the jungle's health. When there are many, and they are healthy, the jungle, an interconnected web of life of many interdependent species of animals and plants, is healthy. And when there are few, in fact, so few that extinction of the largest animal in the ecosystem is a distinct possibility, it means the jungle is dying.

If tigers are on the brink of extinction, so too is the jungle, so too is the planet. Here are data:

More tigers are kept in captivity in the U.S. than are left in the wild -- and there are few regulations to keep these tigers from ending up on the black market. The largest numbers of captive tigers are in Texas (an estimated 3,000+), but they are also kept in other states.

With pelts selling for $20,000 and a single paw worth as much as $1,000, the value of a dead tiger has never been higher, say those who investigate the trade. Last month the Indian government announced a surge in killings of tigers by poachers, with 88 found dead in 2009, double the previous year. Because figures are based on carcasses found on reserves or tiger parts seized at border crossings, conservationists say the true number is far higher.

sources

What is causing the extinction? The threats to tiger survival are apparently quite clear. There don't seem to be any mysteries. The threats are mainly population growth, deforestation, hunting, poaching, and the illegal trade of tiger bones and other parts. Private, unregulated captivity of tigers in the US may contribute to illegal trade in their bones and other parts.

Permit me to cut to the chase. I am painfully aware that I have no idea what to do to halt the extinction of tigers. I personally have no plan. But others clearly do. As small, interim steps, I suggest your immediate support to the following:

Panthera. I discovered Panthera yesterday. I gave them a donation. Panthera uses 100% of donations for preservation projects. You can earmark your gift to a particular species.

Big Cat Rescue

World Wildlife Fund

This is the Internet. Small contributions by large numbers of people can make enormous changes possible. I am happy to have made a donation to Panthera. I hope you will join me.

I also suggest spreading the story of this extinction far and wide. Use the Internet to spread it. The situation merits serious attention. Yes, the tiger is not alone in facing extinction; there are many large cats across the world that also face extinction. These include the Iberian Lynx, the Florida Panther, and jaguars throughout Central America. But the tiger, because of the Chinese New Year and 2010 being the Year of the Tiger, is right now the most visible animal humans are driving into extinction. That is a story that needs to be told. It needs to be reflected upon. And it merits serious discussion about just what can be done to save the tiger and spare the planet. But before there can be a discussion, the news of this extinction needs to be spread. I am happy to do that. I hope you will join me.

Yesterday, as a comment to an essay, LaFeminista posted William Blake's famous poem:

Tiger Tiger. burning bright,
In the forests of the night;
What immortal hand or eye.
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

In what distant deeps or skies.
Burnt the fire of thine eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire?
What the hand, dare seize the fire?

And what shoulder, & what art,
Could twist the sinews of thy heart?
And when thy heart began to beat.
What dread hand? & what dread feet?

What the hammer? what the chain,
In what furnace was thy brain?
What the anvil? what dread grasp.
Dare its deadly terrors clasp?

When the stars threw down their spears
And watered heaven with their tears:
Did he smile His work to see?
Did he who made the lamb make thee?

Tiger Tiger burning bright,
In the forests of the night:
What immortal hand or eye,
Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?

She and I both sigh at this 1794 poem. And I ask, more than 2 centuries after Blake wrote it, "What mortal hands dare destroy thy fearful symmetry?" How dare we permit this devastation to occur.

Happy Year Of The (Almost Extinct) Tiger

Tiger In Captivity

The Tiger is almost extinct. This situation is beyond disquieting. It's a very scary, dire one for our small planet. As Meteor Blades wrote yesterday

"Sometimes fury and despair are the only responses that one can come up with. It seems as if nothing anybody does - laws, scoldings, appeals to people's better nature - will stop this needless, heedless destruction.

Tigers are the top of the jungle food chain. They're "megafauna", the kind of big, well known animal that is an indicator of the jungle's health. When there are many, and they are healthy, the jungle, an interconnected web of life of many interdependent species of animals and plants, is healthy. And when there are few, in fact, so few that extinction of the largest animal in the ecosystem is a distinct possibility, it means the jungle is dying, if not the planet. It means that the first, large feline extinction since the sabre toothed tiger is around the corner. And that is not a cause, but a symptom of the dying of Earth.

Today, February 14, is the New Year of the Year of the Tiger. Time reports:

The Year of the Tiger begins on Feb. 14, which should mean good things for the world. In Chinese astrology, tigers are known as bold and independent, good luck against fire and thieves.

But if the Year of the Tiger ends up being anything like every other year over the past few decades, it won't be very good for tigers themselves. The princely animals are among the most endangered species on the planet. In the wild, they number fewer than 3,000; their habitat, which once stretched in Asia from the Pacific Ocean to the Caspian Sea, has shrunk by more than 90% over the past century, and it's shrinking still. "We once had more than 100,000 of these animals," says Sybille Klenzendorf, the director of the World Wildlife Fund's U.S. Species Conservation Program. "There's a real chance that we will lose this animal in our own lifetime."

There are many threats to the tiger's survival. They are easily categorized:

[Tigers] face a battle on many fronts: tigers are threatened by deforestation, hunting and the illegal trade of their bones and other parts, which are used in some forms of traditional Chinese medicine, mostly for consumers in Asia.

But one of the most unexpected threats to the tiger comes here in the U.S., where there are more tigers kept in private captivity then there are surviving wild animals left in the world. ...conservationists worry that captive tigers could too easily end up fueling the illegal global wildlife trade.

This is a very ugly picture. And the bottom line is extinction. And death.

I've been obsessed with the loss of the tigers. It has filled me with grief, despair, anger, and rage. Why? A brief review might help to explain my feelings, if you've not been following this:

More tigers are kept in captivity in the U.S. than are left in the wild -- and there are few regulations to keep these tigers from ending up on the black market. The largest numbers of captive tigers are in Texas (an estimated 3,000+), but they are also kept in other states.

source

With pelts selling for $20,000 and a single paw worth as much as $1,000, the value of a dead tiger has never been higher, say those who investigate the trade. Last month the Indian government announced a surge in killings of tigers by poachers, with 88 found dead in 2009, double the previous year. Because figures are based on carcasses found on reserves or tiger parts seized at border crossings, conservationists say the true number is far higher.

source

It's disgraceful. I am worried that tigers might be becoming extinct. I have written some essays about that (this is the third). The idea that tigers are becoming extinct is making me ill: it brings on feelings of anger, sadness, despair, grief, longing, anger, rage, frustration. I find myself thinking about it. Constantly. I don't understand why humans allow this sort of depredation of the planet, and why in general they remain oblivious to it. So I write my essays. I would scream and yell, but I doubt anyone would hear me.

I am painfully aware that I have no idea what to do to prevent the extinction of tigers. I have no plan. As small, interim steps, I suggest support for the following:

Big Cat Rescue

World Wildlife Fund

Wildlife Conservation Society

I also suggest spreading the story of this extinction far and wide. The situation merits serious attention. Yes, the tiger is not alone in facing extinction; there are several large cats across the world that also face extinction. These include the Iberian Lynx, the Florida Panther, and jaguars throughout Central America. But the tiger, because of the Chinese Zodiac, is right now the most visible animal humans are driving into extinction. That is a story that needs to be told. It needs to be reflected upon. And it merits serious discussion about just what can be done to save the tiger and spare the planet.

Free The Tigers! Spare The Tigers!

Captive Tigers in China Waiting For Slaughter

A few days ago I was worried that tigers might be becoming extinct, so I wrote an essay about it. The idea that tigers were becoming extinct was making me ill: it brought on feelings of anger, sadness, despair, grief, longing. I found myself thinking about it. Constantly.

As if all of that weren't enough, I then found this in the New York Times:

The crowd-pleasing Year of the Tiger, which begins Sunday, could be a lousy year for the estimated 3,200 tigers that still roam the world’s diminishing forests.

With as few as 20 in the wild in China, the country’s tigers are a few gun blasts away from extinction, and in India poachers are making quick work of the tiger population, the world’s largest. The number there, around 1,400, is about half that of a decade ago and a fraction of the 100,000 that roamed the subcontinent in the early 20th century.

Shrinking habitat remains a daunting challenge, but conservationists say the biggest threat to Asia’s largest predator is the Chinese appetite for tiger parts. Despite a government ban on the trade since 1993, there is a robust market for tiger bones, traditionally prized for their healing and aphrodisiac qualities, and tiger skins, which have become cherished trophies among China’s nouveau riche.

With pelts selling for $20,000 and a single paw worth as much as $1,000, the value of a dead tiger has never been higher, say those who investigate the trade. Last month the Indian government announced a surge in killings of tigers by poachers, with 88 found dead in 2009, double the previous year. Because figures are based on carcasses found on reserves or tiger parts seized at border crossings, conservationists say the true number is far higher.

And now as I think about the end of tigers, I feel wave after wave of anger, sadness, despair, grief, longing.

And all of those feelings are amplified by response to this news. Shrugging, yes. Mumbling, yes. But mostly, the response is silence. Crickets. And more and more crickets. You can look at the comments here and here. There are possibilities other than mass apathy: maybe my writing wasn't very good and it didn't elicit any response, maybe the situation is just completely overwhelming, and nobody knows what to do. Maybe it's that nobody read the essay, or the comments left in Open Threads pointing to it. There are I suppose a lot of other possibilities.

But to me it means that shortly, very shortly tigers will be living solely in captivity on this planet. And after that, they will slowly become extinct. Because they don't belong in cages, walking in circles, going slowly and inevitably insane.

All I can do is point to these reports and ask, "Are we as humans going to let this happen?" And when I do that, what will I hear as a response?

Ten Best Goals of 2009

These are ten unbelievable goals. The video quality isn't great, and sometimes you have to watch the second and third replays to get what happened, but this is stunning nevertheless. Nilmar's goal and Grafite's seem to me the most astonishing. But every one of these is great.

Haiti: We Are The World

The question, the eternal question about this is, and remains: how do you take the energy of this performance into the world and keep it going? How do you make it bloom? How do you keep it new? How do you ride it to a better world?

You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will be as one

Blue Tigers

Today WWF issued a report on tigers. Among other distressing items, there is this:

More tigers are kept in captivity in the U.S. than are left in the wild -- and there are few regulations to keep these tigers from ending up on the black market. The largest numbers of captive tigers are in Texas (an estimated 3,000+), but they are also kept in other states

Soon, if you go looking for tigers, there may not be any to find in the wild. Just in the zoo. You'll be able to watch them walk in circles and growl and snarl. You'll have to imagine, if you can, what it would be like to encounter one while you were walking in the brush:



But I digress. Jorge Luis Borges was really interested in, in fact obsessed with tigers. In his story Blue Tigers the narrator, a professor of logic, searches for a Blue Tiger that was reportedly found in the Ganges Delta. He doesn't find the tiger. Instead, the local villagers send him on a series of wild goose chases by telling him that the tiger has been sighted in various places in the area. He never finds the tiger. No blue tigers. No yellow tigers. No white tigers. Instead he finds something fantastic: "stones of the spawn," blue stones whose behavior defies logic, science and mathematics. But he never finds any tigers, blue or any other color.

When I first read the story, I thought the unsuccessful search for the Blue Tiger was not a big problem. There were, I thought, other tigers to be found. If a Blue Tiger weren't found, that was fine. You could go into the jungle and find other tigers. Thousands of them. Maybe they wouldn't be blue, but at least you could find a tiger if you wanted to.

But now the missing Blue Tiger, the one not found in the story, has become a bigger problem. A far bigger, more worrisome one. Soon, humans will have made common tigers as rare as blue ones in Borges stories. And we will be devastatingly poorer for our reckless and stupid conduct that killed them off. When we act like that, we humans don't deserve anything as wonderful, as fierce, as wild, as beautiful as a tiger.

Madiba Day

This is wonderful:

South Africans on Thursday celebrated the steps that sounded apartheid's death knell 20 years ago: Nelson Mandela walking to freedom after 27 years in prison.

Thousands gathered for commemorations near Cape Town at what was known in 1990 as Victor Verster, the last prison where Mandela was held. The crowds milled around a 10-foot (3-meter) high bronze statue erected at the prison in 2008 depicting Mandela's first steps as a free man. Exactly 20 years ago, Mandela emerged from Victor Verster on foot, hand-in-hand with his then-wife Winnie, fist raised, smiling but resolute.

''We knew that his freedom meant that our freedom had also arrived,'' Cyril Ramaphosa, a leader in Mandela's African National Congress who headed a welcome committee for Mandela in 1990, told the crowd at the prison Thursday.

Earlier, Ramaphosa and other ANC leaders had approached the gates of the prison to re-enact Mandela's 1990 walk. Arms linked, they stepped through shouting: ''Viva Mandela!''

Dear Ms. Palin:

Dear Ms. Palin: I know that people are today making fun of you in the media and on the blogs because of your Nashville appearance at the Tea Bag Pay As You Go Event. They're complaining about your irritating voice, your inability to complete a sentence, your having no plan and your writing on your hand. They say you are speaking "word salad." That's sad, but that's how it is in America. People have the right to make fun of their politicians, and they should. And, lest you forget, you're a politician. Or maybe now you're not a politician any more and you're an entertainer. Or something. Anyway, those folks cherish their "right" to make fun of you.

Regardless, I have a small proposal for you to consider. I realize that it's unorthodox to print it here and publish it on the Internet, but after all it is 2010 so I beg your indulgence. How else can I get your attention?

The proposal: How about you pay me $50,000 before your next "speech" and I will write it for you. I am an excellent writer. I know grammar and sentence structure. I know how to construct a paragraph. I had an elite, liberal education, and I have a graduate degree, and I've written books, but I won't tell anyone that. I know how to write. And I'll keep it simple so your audience will follow it perfectly.

I assure you the speech I write for you will be (1) far more whacked out than the one you gave in Nashville, (2) far more clever (you might be tempted to say "cleverer"), and (3) your supporters, all those superannuated, semi and fully retired, more or less rich, white folks, will really love it. They will have something that is akin to an orgasm when you deliver my speech. Only it won't be an actual orgasm, they'll just smile and hyperventilate and cheer a lot. And want to smoke afterward.

You know how to reach me.

Love, davidseth

PS. I can see Uranus from here.

On Being A Human Cannonball

I'd rather be a rocket than a launching pad. I'd rather be a hammer than a nail. I'd rather be a human cannonball. That would be best. That would be unbelievably exciting. That would be the way to live. No safety nets. No crash helmets. Blasted through the air. But first before the launch, there's some important research. Research, as Mr. Toad once said, is my life.

Hugo Zacchini may have been the first human cannoball. Born in Peru on October 20, 1898, he died on the same day in 1975 in San Bernardino. His wiki is only a stub but it tells the following about him:

*"He was known for being a daredevil and a painter, and for being litigious." This is quite a sentence for a two paragraph biography.

*He was an interpreter of as many as 11 languages.

*He received two engineering degrees from the University of Florida, was educated at the Rome Arts Academy, and got a master's degree at Jamstown (NY) Academy.

*He was the victorious named plaintiff in Zacchini v. Scripps Howard, 433 U.S. 562 (1977), decided by the US Supreme Court:

"Zacchini sued Scripps-Howard, the owner of an Ohio television station, when it filmed, and then broadcast on the evening news, Zacchini's entire act of being shot out of a cannon at a county fair. The United States Supreme Court sided with Zacchini, ruling 5 to 4 that the publicity rights overrode the First Amendment rights in this case where the entire act was shown on television."

On the other hand, maybe the first human cannonball "in 1877 at the Royal Aquarium in London, was a girl called "Zazel" (Rossa Matilda Richter, then only 14)." She too later toured with the PT Barnum Circus.

On the third hand, maybe it was George Layal who in 1875 was the first human cannonball.

The Zacchinis, however, were clearly the prominent, first family of human cannonballing:

The most famous family, the Zacchinis (over 35 members) devoted their entire life to this entertainment starting in 1922, coming to the US in 1929. At times (1939 to 1991) they had as many as 5 traveling shows with 14 cannons. The Zacchini's introduced launching two people simultaneously from the same cannon. Aside from the original five brothers who took flight, eventually two of their daughters also became human bullets (Duina and Egle Victoria). Hugo was the last of the family members to take flight on August 29, 1991. The Zacchinis also suffered several serious accidents, including one, where two of them collided in mid air having been simultaneously shot from opposing cannons.

Nevermind that none of the dates match other reports. Or that the places don't match up. Forget all of that. In human cannonballing the facts aren't as important as the flight. Not even close.

The human cannonball is a performance in which a person (the "cannonball") is ejected from a specially designed cannon. The impetus is provided not by gunpowder, but by either a spring or jet of compressed air. In a circus performance, gunpowder may be used to provide visual and auditory effects, but this is unrelated to the launching mechanism.

The human cannonball lands on a horizontal net or inflated bag, the placement of which is determined by classical mechanics. Outdoor performances may also aim at a body of water."

source

But what's it like to be shot out of a cannon?

The propellant of choice today is compressed air. The human projectile climbs into a hollow topless cylinder that slides inside the cannon barrel. Having been lowered to the bottom of the barrel, the cylinder is blasted forward by compressed air at 150-200 pounds per square inch. The cylinder stops at the cannon's mouth. Its occupant doesn't.

Being shot from a cannon, like jumping out of an airplane, isn't that strenuous; it's the sudden stop at the end that's a bitch. Elvin Bale, the "Human Space Shuttle," was experimenting with air bags to break his fall while on tour in 1986. He overshot the airbags and crashed into a wall, seriously injuring himself. On another occasion two members of the Zacchini family, long famous for its cannonballing exploits, were launched simultaneously from opposite ends of the circus. They collided in mid-air; one Zacchini broke her back.

Historian A.H. Coxe says of 50 human cannonballs more than 30 have been killed, mostly by falling outside the net. Even if you avoid mishaps, many human cannonballs black out in flight, which makes me wonder about long-term brain damage. (OK, I lied when I said it wasn't strenuous. Sue me.)

soure

But why try to describe it? It's 2010. You can see it.



Fantastic. Remarkable. Inspiring.

I've been saying for the past week that I aspired to live as a human cannonball. A human rocket. Flying. Fearless. Astonishing. A shooting star. Defying gravity. Isn't that what it's all about?

Happy Birthday, James Joyce

It's the birthday of James Joyce, born in Dublin (1882), who said, "The demand that I make of my reader is that he should devote his whole life to reading my works." Joyce wrote Ulysses (1922) and Finnegan's Wake (1939); an autobiographical novel, Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man (1916); and a short-story collection, Dubliners (1914), among other works.

He was educated by Jesuits, first visited a prostitute at the age of 14, dropped out of medical school and aspired to be an opera star. He met and fell in love with a Galway hotel maid named Nora Barnacle when he was 22 years old, and he set the action of Ulysses on the day he had his first date with Nora, June 16, 1904. It's now commemorated all over the world each year as Bloomsday, after the novel's protagonist, Leopold Bloom.

Shortly after meeting Nora, he convinced her to leave Ireland with him and elope to continental Europe. He thought he'd lined up a teaching job as a language instructor, but that fell through, and he ended up working at a bank in Rome for a while. They were forever impoverished and constantly relying on Joyce's brother Stanislaus for money.

They had a son, Giorgio, and after that James and Nora slept head to foot, an attempt at birth control. It didn't seem to be an effective form, though, and Nora became pregnant with Lucia about a year after giving birth to Giorgio. Joyce was a doting father, liked to spoil his kids, never punished either one and once told an interviewer, "Children must be educated by love, not punishment."

Nora was famously apathetic toward her husband's writing. Joyce worked at night and laughed so loudly at his own words that Nora would get up and tell him to stop writing and stop laughing so that she could get a bit of sleep. Shortly after Ulysses (Joyce pronounced it "Oolissays")was published, she remarked to a fan of his: "I've always told him he should give up writing and take up singing." Ulysses took seven years of unbroken labor, which translated into 20,000 hours of work.

source

Peru: The Devastation Continues, The US Traditional Media Ignore It

Devastation in Peru continues. Today's La Republica reports the bad news:

Intense Rains Leave More than 100,000 Affected

The prolonged rainfall that fell on the southeastern Andes Sunday night left over 100 thousand people affected, with particular intensity in the Cusco region, regional authorities reported.

The regional president of Cusco, Hugo Gonzales, told the AP that on Sunday the rains had left "more than 60 thousand people affected, seven thousand homes destroyed, 17 thousand hectares of crops affected and so far 14 bridges that may collapse from being in poor condition.

Gonzales said that "losses translate into almost $ 250 million dollars and that tourism, the largest employer in the region is losing almost a million dollars a day, which is aggravated by the isolation of Machu Picchu from tourists.

(translation by me)

The report from Puno, to the Southeast, is particularly disturbing:

the rains left "more than 22 thousand farmers affected, 23 million acres of crops worthless, and 25 thousand dead cattle including llamas and vicunas."

But if you're not going to read Peruvian newspapers on line, you won't know much about this disaster. If you're in the US, just try a Google news search for "Peru floods" and see what it turns up. Right now the top story is from Brunei. And that's one of the very few entries from today. The rest concern rescuing tourists at the end of last week, some first person tourist stories about being rescued, and the thinnest of reports from Saturday and Sunday.

Long story short, the traditional US media just aren't reporting about this disaster. And they are apparently not going to. That makes it harder to get contributions and other aid from the US for Peru's relief. And it also continues the extremely distorted way the US traditional media cover events in this hemisphere.

If we want to end this embargo on news, if we want others in the US to know what's going on in Peru, the only thing I can think of is writing essays like this one and this one and this one. And if you, dear reader, would consider doing the same, writing an essay, we might be able eventually to overcome the enforced silence and bring US attention to the devastation in Peru. And to other events in this hemisphere as well.