Today's Stories

July 14, 2008

Uri Avnery
Will Israel and / or the US Attack Iran?

Paul Craig Roberts
Enabling Tyranny

July 12 / 13, 2008

Alexander Cockburn
Lock and Load--It's the Law!

Jeffrey St. Clair
The Origins of the Western Greens

James Abourezk
Talking World War III Blues: From Dylan to Iran

Nicole Colson
The Ethanol Scam

Stan Cox
Fixing a Broken Agriculture

Ismael Hossein-Zadeh
Is There an Oil Shortage?

Wajahat Ali /
Omid Safi
The Future of Iran: an Interview with Iranian Nobel Laureate Shirin Ebadi

John Stauber
There May be a Left, But is it Moving? An Interview with David Sirota

Alan Farago
The Crash of the King of Liquidity

Missy Beattie
Dark Neighborhoods

Robert Fantina
Bush's Last Yes Man: Canada, Guantanamo and Yankee Poodles

Rannie Amiri
Mubarak Hires the Mosque

Gregory Kafoury
After the Obama Betrayal

Fran Shor
The Audacity of Hype

Martha Rosenberg
Why Heifer International is Rolling in Dung

David Macaray
Will There be an Actors Strike?

Andrew Wimmer
No Lies! No War!

Ron Jacobs
They Call Me the Seeker

Farzana Versey
The Kashmir Chiaroscuro

Kim Nicolini
Angelina Jolie's Wanted: Taking the M-Fers Down with Guns and Exploding Rats

Poets' Basement
Wright, Fleming, Solomon and Birnbaum

Website of the Weekend
Parsing Jesse Ventura

July 11, 2008

Kevin Alexander Gray
Why Does Barack Obama Hate My Family?

Sasan Fayazmanesh
Historical Amnesia and the Shoot Down of Iran Air Flight 655

Peter Morici
Breaking Down the Trade Deficit

Mike Whitney
Worse Than McCain?

Manuel Garcia, Jr.
Oiling the War Machine

Robert Weissman
Crime, Punishment and ExxonMobil

Ramzy Baroud
The Not-So-Historic Barak-Talabani Handshake

Kelly Overton
If There is a Chimp Heaven

Adrian Burgos
In Praise of Jules Tygiel

Website of the Day
Wendell Berry on Mountaintop Removal

July 10, 2008

Brian McKenna
McCain's Melanoma Cover-Up

Paul Craig Roberts
Watching Greed Murder the Economy

Saul Landau
Mississippi River Blues

Ron Jacobs
Who Will Leave Iraq First?

Joshua Frank
Cutting Deals with Big Timber's Darth Vader

Peter Morici
What's Driving the Wall Street Rout

Alan Maass
Jesse Helms Finally Does the Right Thing

Robert Weissman
Humanitarian Failure at the G8

William Blum
Dr. Strangelove

Alan Farago
Coral Reef Meltdown

Website of the Day
Lieberman Must Go!

July 9, 2008

Ismael Hossein-Zadeh
Are They Really Oil Wars?

Luis Rodriguez
The Deadly Fallout from Gang Injunctions

Sheldon Richman
What's Wrong with Selling Your Vote?

Fatemeh Keshavarz
Lessons from Sa'di of Shiraz on "Enhanced Interrogation Techniques"

Chad Hanson
Blowing Smoke: Logging Industry Lies on Forest Fires and Climate Change

Sen. Russ Feingold
The Problems with the FISA Bill

Niranjan Ramakrishnan
Defining Deviancy Down with FISA

Dave Lindorff
Paul Krugman's Blind Spot

Stanley Heller
A Damned Good Assembly

Philip Rizk
Sick at the Gaza Crossing

Website of the Day
Mumia on Nader

July 8, 2008

Nikolas Kozloff
Riding the Colombia Gravy Train

Laura Carlsen
North America Doesn't Exist: the New Geography of Trade

Mike Whitney
Bush's Rampage in Somalia

Andy Worthington
Scandal at Diego Garcia

Patrick Irelan
The Empire Goes to the Movies

Chellis Glendinning
The Un-tied States of America

David Macaray
A Union Story

Dave Lindorff
Mumia's Long-Shot Appeal

John Chuckman
The Myths of Independence Day

Phillip Doe
FISA and the Decline of America

Website of the Day
Daniel Ellsberg on Warrantless Wiretap Bill

July 7, 2008

Patrick Bond
Can Reparations for Apartheid Profits be Won in US Courts?

Kathy Kelly
Cold Shoulders

Andy Worthington
Repatriation as Russian Roulette

Clifton Ross
A Rescue Staged for the Screen

Elizabeth Schulte
Obama's War Room

Ralph Nader
The Patriotism of Deeds

Dave Lindorff
Keeping Count

Binoy Kampmark
The World According to Jesse Helms

Stephen Fleischman
Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Change

Website of the Day
Time for a Change

July 5 / 6, 2008

Alexander Cockburn
Could Anyone be "Worse" Than Bush?

Jeffrey St. Clair /
Joshua Frank
Preliminary Notes from No Man's Land

Patrick Cockburn
Blowback from a Strike on Iran

Mike Whitney
Hunkering Down in Afghanistan with Field Marshall Obama

Robert Fantina
Obama, Iraq and Change

Binoy Kampmark
The Anwar Case: Snitching and Sodomizing

Rannie Amiri
Can Nasrallah Unite Lebanon?

Eric Ruder
Hidden Casualties

Brian Cloughley
Israel Flexes Its Muscles

William Blum
Some Thoughts on Patriotism

Frank Barat
The One-Word Solution

Christopher Brauchli
Bush's Phony Pollution Accounting

David Yearsley
Rubbert Shines, as US Envoy Puts Foot in His Mouth

Ron Jacobs
U.S. Blues

Karim Makdisi
On Soccer and Politics in Lebanon

Wendy Thompson /
Chris Kutalik
What Can We Learn from the American Axle Strike?

N.D. Jayaprakash
The NPT as a Roadblock to Disarmament

Ramzy Baroud
Journalistic Imperatives

Kelly Overton
Animal Rights and Obama

Richard Neville
Bitch Fights and Tomorrow's Top Model

Poets' Basement
Anderson, Gibbons, Matson and Buknatski

Website of the Weekend
Ginsberg and Cassady on "Extremists"

July 4, 2008

Kathy Kelly
Istiklal

Dave Lindorff
My War Story

Paul Krassner
Confessions of a Barista

Jackie Corr
In the Footsteps of Evel Knievel: Obama Heads Back to Butte

Laray Polk
Military-Industrial Convergence

Dan Bacher
Dead Runs: Salmon Fishing Banned in Central Valley Rivers

Walter Brasch
The Rocket's Red Glare--May be Chinese

Charles Modiano
Hall of Fame Hypocrisy

Website of the Day
Springsteen: Independence Day

July 3, 2008

Sharon Smith
Exxon's Legal Guardians

Andy Worthington
Another Torture Victim Gets Charged

Laura Carlsen
NAFTA and the Elephant in the Room

Peter Morici
Crisis Grips the Jobs Market

Ramzi Kysia
Breaking Into a Prison

Martha Rosenberg
Mandatory School Milk and the Early Death of Football Players

Anne Landman
Who Really Benefits From Voluntary Codes of Corporate Conduct?

Dave Zirin
Grand Theft Hoops

Kristin Bricker
US Contractor Leads Torture Training in Mexico

Website of the Day
Bush Tours America to Survey Damage from His Presidency

July 2, 2008

Patrick Irelan
Holy Obama

Vijay Prashad
Lunch with Karzai

Brian Cloughley
Sense of Honor, French and US Style

Ralph Nader
Economic Domino Theory

Robert Fantina
General Stupidity: McCain, Obama and Clark

Dave Lindorff
What's So Special About Veterans?

Parvez Ahmed
Obama and Those Pesky Muslim Rumors

Robert Bryce
The Democrats and Off-Shore Drilling

Website of the Day
King Corn: Q&A

July 1, 2008

Alexander Cockburn
Two Months Later, Seymour Hersh Strains to Catch Up With CounterPunch

Mike Whitney
Getting to the Heart of America's Economic Crisis: an Interview with Michael Hudson

Douglas Macgregor
Obama's General?

Steven Higgs
Fighting the NAFTA Super-Highway

Andy Worthington
Guantánamo as Alice in Wonderland

Binoy Kampmark
The Global Seed Police

Dave Lindorff
Blood Money Democrats

Roger Burbach
Fighting Food Fascism

Richard W. Behan
The Story Behind George Bush's Lies

Gary Leupp
The McCain Edge Among Voters on Iraq

Website of the Day
Mountaintop Removal and the Fight for Coalfield Justice

June 30, 2008

Peter Lee
Did a Plutonium Generator End Up in the Ganges?

Jeff Sommers
Burying the Bloody Shirt; A New Age for Latvia Dawns? "Astatu Loskutovu!"

David Macaray
The AFL-CIO Votes to Endorse Obama

Martha Rosenberg
Sex Work is Different from Sex Slavery, aver Carnal Toilers

David Price
Blind Whistling Phreaks and the FBI's Historical Reliance on Phone Tap Criminality

Alexandra Early
Report from El Salvador: Why They All Keep Coming

June 28 / 29, 2008

Alexander Cockburn
Guess What "Surprise" Republicans Yearn For

Jeffrey St. Clair
Nike's Bad Air

Joan P. Mencher
The Human Right to Eat

Nikolas Kozloff
Nader, Obama and White Talk

Jason Hribal
Tillie, Elephants and the Zoo

Alan Maass
Obama Swerves Right

Robert Fantina
Iraq and the New York Times

Bill Moyers /
Michael Winship
It Was Oil, All Along

Mike Whitney
A Glimmer of Light in Television Wasteland

Justin E. H. Smith
Collective Guilt and the Fate of Kosovo

Pham Binh
The Mendacity of Hope

David Yearsley
The Rest is Noise

Christopher Ketcham
19 Aphorisms

Jeremy R. Hammond
Bush and the Press vs. the Constitution

Kathleen M. Barry
An Open Letter to Barney Frank on Israel

Walter Brasch
Politics and Animal Cruelty in Pennsylvania

Brett Drugge
A Field Trip to the Reagan Library

Susie Day
Sex Sans the City

Website of the Day
How to Expose a Hypocritcal Politician

June 27, 2008

Franklin C. Spinney
The Defense Reform Trap

Jonathan Cook
Israel's Encaging of Gaza

Brian Cloughley
Chaos in Afghanistan

Saree Makdisi
Occupation by Bureaucracy

Liliana Segura
Reactionary Change: Obama and the Death Penalty

Paul Krassner
Remembering George Carlin

William S. Lind
The War and the Yellow Press

Candace Cohn
Embracing Big Brother

Ron Jacobs
What's a Voter to Do?

Binoy Kampmark
Beached in Chile

Website of the Day
Zoom Uganda

June 26, 2008

Patrick Cockburn
Who's Actually Winning in Iraq?

Nikolas Kozloff
Kinder and Gentler Assassination Techniques? Obama Waffles on School of the Americas

William P. O'Connor
The Drone of Experts

Saul Landau
McClellan's Mini Mea Culpa

Ashley Smith
Which Way Forward for the Antiwar Movement?

Dave Lindorff
Our Kids and Their Kids: Terrorists or Victims?

David Macaray
A Brief History of Union Negotiations

Binoy Kampmark
Warming Seats at the Hague: John Howard and War Crimes

Matt Reichel
There's No Hope at the Ballot Box

Remi Kenazi
You Don't Mess With the Racism!

Website of the Day
A Movement Afoot in the Heartlands

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"Any law which violates the inalienable rights of man is essentially unjust and tyrannical; it is not a law at all."

-- Maximilien Robespierre

Bastille Day Edition
July 14, 2008

Shine a Light on DVD

Stones Paint It Black

By PHYLLIS POLLACK

Even if you have already seen Shine A Light in a theater, there is an upcoming DVD/Blu-ray package slated for release that is still worthy of buying. So you think you’ve seen the Light? Think again.

When Academy Award-winning director Martin Scorsese’s Rolling Stones concert documentary Shine A Light was released on April 4, its theatrical run in both Imax and conventional theaters was limited to a select number of theaters due to its documentary format. Therefore, countless fans still have not yet seen this critically acclaimed film, documenting performances from the largest grossing concert tour of all time. However, they will finally be able to do so when Shine A Light is released on DVD/Blu-ray on July 29.

Because I had seen Shine A Light prior to its theatrical release, and had written reviews on it, in addition to the fact I had both attended and written extensively about the Rolling Stones press conference that was held in New York for the film, and I had interviewed the Rolling Stones on the red carpet (which was actually black) at the NY premiere, I wanted to go full circle, and review what is in the DVD package, aside from what is included in it that was seen in its theatrical release. Therefore, the focus here will be on the package’s added features, because I have already reviewed the theatrical release it contains.

Already having this DVD/Blu-ray package, it is apparent that its Special Features create a sequel to the theatrical release. Parts of the Featurette leave you thinking, “Don’t stop” when they end, and a few of them could segue into new films of their own.

The entirety of Shine A Light is the predominate feature included in the retail package that is slated for release by Paramount Home Entertainment.  Filmed at the shows that were held at New York’s Beacon Theatre from the Bigger Bang shows on October 29 and November 1, 2006, with direction from Scorsese, whose numerous credits include No Direction Home: Bob Dylan, Kundun, The Departed, Casino, Goodfellas, and Raging Bull, several award–winning cinematographers captured the band on stage, including Robert Richardson (The Aviator), Robert Elswit (There Will Be Blood), Andrew Lesnie (Lord of The Rings: The Fellowship Of the Rings), John Toll (Legends Of the Fall), Ellen Kuras (Summer of Sam), Stuart Dryburgh (The Piano), and Declan Quinn (Leaving Las Vegas).

The DVD is widescreen enhanced, and features Dolby Digital English 5.1 Surround, plus subtitles in English, French and Spanish. The Blu-ray offers 1080p high definition, English 5.1 Dolby TrueHD and English 5.1 DTS Master Audio and English, English SDH, French and Spanish Subtitles. This will mark the first time a Stones concert film has been released in High Def on Blu-ray.

In addition to the film Shine A Light, there are also four bonus songs in HD, performed in their entirety, starting with “Paint It, Black.” While the credits on the disc do not include a comma in the song’s title, I have a penchant for including one here, as its original release that topped both the British and American charts in 1966 contained one. At one point during the song’s performance, Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards is seen kneeling, with one knee one the stage, as he plays guitar. The way in which Richards emotes during his playing is as singular, and as expressive as Chuck Berry doing his duck walk. No one does Chuck better than Chuck, and as we have seen for over forty years, no one does Keith Richards better than Richards, whether it is when he is playing or when he is not.

The band’s rendition of Richards’ “Little T&A” is also among the full live performance bonus tracks, not seen in the theatrically released film.  “Tits and ass with soul,” “The little bitch got soul,” he sings, with an added kick that comes from a short vamp, courtesy of Stones bassist Darryl Jones. This is one of the tracks in which more footage is seen of backup singers Bernard Fowler, Lisa Fischer and Blondie Chaplin. The rest of the musicians in band are also intermittently seen throughout the added features.

The third bonus performance, “I’m Free,” witnesses Jagger dancing on stage, as the rest of the band plays. With keyboardist Chuck Leavell counting, “One, two,” the band breaks into the fourth bonus track, “Undercover Of The Night,” on which Jagger plays his Fender Telecaster.

The Supplemental Featurette section features additional newsreel footage that was not included in the theatrical version of the film. It continues to show a parade of hopelessly inept, pathetic interviews the band is subjected to doing on a constant basis. The ironies are glaringly obvious (at least to some of us), but these moments still manage to provide great entertainment due to their utter stupidity. 

Here is one such exchange from 1973:

Interviewer: “There’s in England, kind of an underground talk about people that are expected to die soon.”

Richards: “I’m on the list.”

Interviewer: “You have taken the number one position on the list on there.”

Richards (irritated, barely concealing his contempt): “Great. Okay, I’ll let you know.”

Stupid questions still plague the band to this day, and it dawns on the viewer that an entire film could be made, consisting entirely of stupid questions people ask the Stones, and how they respond.

The Featurette also includes guitarist Ronnie Wood, stating that Eric Clapton had told him, “I could have had your job.” Woody notes that he responded to Clapton by saying, “But Eric, you’ve got to live with them. You’ve got to be able to live with these people.”

There is ample footage of Mick Jagger. As a result, we revisit some of his many incarnations, reflecting numerous trends and fashions from various periods of the band’s career.

Drummer Charlie Watts says he’s happier at home than on the road, and he has a discussion with Scorsese about wardrobe.

Blues legend Buddy Guy discusses his first having met the Stones at Chess Studios in Chicago, when he was recording “My Time After A While.”  Guy recalls, “I am like, ‘who is that?”  Guy goes on to explain how it came about that he began answering to the name “Motherfucker.”  This is another segue, a prefect vignette, where an entire new film could begin.

There is also rehearsal footage of “Wild Horses,” featuring Jagger on harp, and rehearsal footage of “Factory Girl.”

There is more of President Clinton with the Secret Service, from the October 29 show, ending his “birthday celebration,” although he was born on August 19. He describes his having been given the opportunity to hold a fundraiser there as one of his birthday presents. Reference is also made to the seating provisions for his sixty guests who will be attending the show.

In part of the DVD’s main feature, Shine A Light, Richards is seen wearing a red and silver pirate pin, a skull with crossed swords. It was a gift to him for his performance in Pirates Of the Caribbean: At World’s End. It is seen on his long black jacket as he performs “You Got The Silver.” As it turns out, in the Supplemental Featurette, there is a scene, presumably during a break of some sort, where Richards is alone on stage, engaged in his thoughts, and playing guitar. What he was playing sounded familiar. After an immediate second listen, I realized it was “Only Found Out Yesterday,” the same song Richards plays in Pirates Of The Caribbean: At World’s End, in his role of Captain Teague.

The words from the song’s title, “Only found out yesterday,” are also lyrics heard in his heartfelt track “Thru And Thru,” from the Voodoo Lounge album. There is also part of the melody line that is reminiscent of that song, as well.

What is the connection with the line “Only Found Out Yesterday?” Well, there’s an interview question that no one has asked yet.

Phyllis Pollack lives in Los Angeles where she is a publicist and music journalist. She can be reached through her blog.

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