Tragedy

Our hearts and prayers go out to the victims and the families of the victims of the bombing on at the Boston Marathon today. This type of atrocity shouldn't happen anywhere in the world, but it always stings more when it is ones own friends and neighbors.

Patrick Nee's A Criminal and an Irishman: A Review

by Matthew Smith

Patrick's Nee's memoir A Criminal and an Irishman: The Inside Story of the Boston Mob-IRA Connection has been in print for a couple of years, but even so it remains a must read for anyone who enjoys a good crime story. This books gives a very personalized glimpse into Boston Irish Mob when James “Whitey” Bulger dominated the underworld.

A Criminal and an Irishman has the virtues and vices of a true memoir. It should not be taken as a history, but neither is it fiction. Congruent time-lines and supporting research are not on Nee agenda. Broader socio-cultural events remain untouched except in the ways in which they personally influence Nee and for the most part remain unexamined.

God and Country Inc.

By Gene Ogorodov

[This is a critique of a SCOTUS case, Hosanna-Tabor v. EEOC, that I wrote a few months back. It first appeared in the Portland Occupier January 28, 2012.]

The Supreme Court made a ruling on the second landmark First Amendment case in three years—Hosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church and School v. EEOC. On 11 January 2012, the Court’s unanimous decision on this case has further secured the rights of corporations hitherto enjoyed only by individual American citizens.

The ruling comes on the heels of the of the controversial judgement in the 21 January 2010 case Citizens United v. FEC, which undermined one hundred years of the legal distinctions between the rights of individuals and the rights of corporations in influencing elections.

Colin Woodard's American Nations: A Review

by Sean O'Rourke

American Nations: A History of the Eleven Rival Regional Cultures of North America, is a critically acclaimed book, by the award winning journalist Colin Woodard, analyzing the influence that regional cultures of North American have had upon the continent. Since its release late in 2011 it has gone from triumph to triumph even wining the 2012 Maine Literary Award for Non-Fiction.

American Nations is hardly the first book comparing regional cultures in the United States. Since David Hackett Fischer's seminal work Albion's Seed, published in 1989, a popular genre of work critiquing American regionalism has arisen with books aimed at a variety of readers. This book sits firmly on the better end of the scale and is a book well worth reading.

RT Op-Ed: Pain in the Brass

In an Op-Ed presented on RT several months ago, “Pain in the Brass: Petraeus Joins Sullied Trinity of Fallen Generals”, William Echols has written an exceptional analysis of Gen. Petraeus' fall from grace. He brings various pieces of puzzle together from break with tradition that was the Petraeus doctrine and ultimate failure to the willingness of the Obama doctrine to ride rough-shod over the American Brass.

With three four-star generals disgraced in as many years and the tale-tale signs that two more (Generals Allen and Ward) will have joined them on the chopping block in as many weeks, Echols' Op-Ed for RT lays bare questions that should be in the forefront of responsible journalism.