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A couple of years ago, in Los Angeles, LI had breakfast with a man who was full to the gills of injuries Israel had received from Yassar Arafat. LI, not as knowledgeable about this subject, was full, at least to the butt, with the ills Israeli had inflicted on Palestinians. The conversation proceeded down the usual dead end, although we didn�t end up throwing the usual acrimonious phrases at each other. It was breakfast, and it was L.A., for God�s sake. We've thought about this argument since then. Since Bush made his Middle Eastern tour, the newspapers have been dutifully filled with analyses of the chances, this time, that the roadmap to peace will get us somewhere. And readers, I would guess, except for those most passionately involved in the issues, have drifted off. In the reign of good King Jimmy Carter, this was a new and vibrant thing. Since, it has become one of the ornaments of American presidencies � each one of them has to have their brand new plan for peace in the M

Bollettino As usual, the LA Times is way ahead of the East Coast in describing hostilities in J-Lo Bremer's 'post-hostile" Iraq. The story, by Michael Slackman, is full of information -- that magic missing ingredient in most of the stories about Iraq ! As LI has pointed out like a maniac, we live in a situation in which major newspapers -- the USA Today, the NYT, the Wash Post -- can't seem to agree on how many American casualties have occured in the last week. This is a little astonishing, and says something about the shadow of amnesia that has so quickly fallen over what is happening in Iraq. The LAT says that "about 40" American deaths, from accidents and hostile fire, have occured since Bush's infamous declaration that hostilities are at an end. That compares with 100 deaths while hostilities were going on. LI also points you, today, to a nice little piece about Ollie North's drug trafficking record . Apparently -- ah, the bizarro aspec

Bollettino LI is frankly indifferent to the fall of Howell Raines. We are interested, however, in the space it takes up. Since we are living in a shift in cultural power to the right -- which is reflected in the gradual erosion of the great establishment liberal papers, which are either turning hawkish -- the WashPost -- or are finding organizational problems used as fulcrums to create press coverage that leans to the right -- the NYT - we are interested in criticism that is happening outside the box. As James Wolcott, in a surprisingly toothy article in Vanity Fair puts it, the press is entirely down on both knees before the Bush P.R. machine. Wollcott is not coy about the implication of fellatio, which is still the primo image of servitude in this culture, for reasons we aren't going to explore right now. Anyway, we think it is odd, to say the least, that the press scandals du jour are about the misdeeds of some minor hacks, since really, Blair's mendacity about the snipe

Bollettino Casualty report: - Assailants opened fire with a rocket-propelled grenade Thursday, killing one American soldier and wounding five, the U.S. military said. It was the latest attack in a tense city where resistance against American occupation has been vocal and sometimes violent. -- AP Forgery Here's a story from the forgery front. It comes from Dennis Dutton from the usually more high brow Aesthetics-online site : "The murder of Eric Hebborn on January 11th brought to a close one of the most illustrious careers of any twentieth-century forger. His body was found on a street in Rome, the city where he had lived since the 1970s, with his skull broken, probably by a hammer blow from behind. Only a few weeks before, he had published his second book, Il Manuale del Falsario (The Faker�s Handbook), a set of complete instructions on how to forge and market fake drawings and paintings from the European tradition." Hebborn, Dutton reports, was an Eng

Bollettino LI recommends a story in the Nation, today, about the unbelievable attempt... well, unbelievable is a strong word ... disgusting attempt ... well, disgusting needs a little gas poured on it, and a lit match tossed towards it, to become the right word... the predictably Bushian attempt (ah, that's it) to allocate money to the drug czar's office for any kind of advertising he's see's fit to put on. The bill would allow advertising, funded by the Federal Government, to attack candidates who advocate legalizing drugs. This is unique . "The ads, mostly on television, have stirred controversy since Walters took over and began running strident drugs-equal-terrorism spots that declare that personal use of marijuana supports terrorism. The House Government Reform Committee tabled action on HR 2086 after negotiations broke down over how far ONDCP could use its social marketing muscle to influence elections. The two parties will attempt some sort of comp

Bollettino Casualty count today: "U.S. Soldier Killed in Central Iraq By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Filed at 7:38 a.m. ET BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -- A U.S. soldier was shot and killed while on patrol in central Iraq early Tuesday, the military said. The shooting took place near the town of Balad, about 55 miles north of the capital, said Maj. William Thurmond, a spokesman for the U.S. Army's V Corps." It is, of course, almost impossible to find this story in today's papers. Just as it seems almost impossible to come up with a casualty count for the last week, with U.S.A. today putting the number at ten killed, and other outlets ranging from 4 to 6. What is interesting is that the same people who, during the war, were adamant about 'supporting the troops" seem quite intent on forgetting them now. Which is just as we suspected. Support the troops until the Commander in Chief grandly ends the war, then ignore their deaths in the non-war that follows

Bollettino A young man goes to India before he knows much of his own country; but he cherishes in his breast, as I hope every man will, a just and laudable partiality for the laws, liberties, rights, and institutions of his own nation. We all do this; and God forbid we should not prefer our own to every other country in the world! but if we go to India with an idea of the mean, degraded state of the people that we are to govern, and especially if we go with these. impressions at an immature age, we know, that, according to the ordinary course of human nature, we shall not treat persons well whom we have learnt to despise. We know that people whom we suppose to have neither laws or rights will not be treated by us as a people who have laws and rights. -- Edmund Burke, Speech on the Impeachment of Warren Hastings. Casualty report for today, the 28th day after the end of the War : Two Iraqi men were killed and two U.S. servicemen injured in an exchange of gunfire at a mosque in B