$1.4 Billion in Cuts Proposed for California Public Colleges $1.4 Billion in Cuts Proposed for California Public Colleges
A budget plan put forth by Gov. Jerry Brown (D-Calif.) may make a $1.4 billion cut in public higher education institutions in the state.
Jan 13, 2011 / StudentNation / StudentNation
In Arizona, Obama Appeals to Our Better Angels In Arizona, Obama Appeals to Our Better Angels
At his best, Barack Obama is a leader who appeals to our better angels, who rode to the White House on a campaign of "hope." Nowhere was Obama's empathy more needed, and ...
Jan 13, 2011 / Ari Berman
Helping Haiti One Year Later Helping Haiti One Year Later
The severity of the current crisis is astonishing. Here's how to help.
Jan 12, 2011 / Peter Rothberg
Empty Rooms: On Nicole Krauss Empty Rooms: On Nicole Krauss
Nicole Krauss's Great House swings from the evocative to the overcharged.
Jan 12, 2011 / Books & the Arts / Alexandra Schwartz
Literature and Exile Literature and Exile
Books are the only homeland of the true writer, books that may sit on shelves or in the memory.
Jan 12, 2011 / Books & the Arts / Roberto Bolaño
Vanishing Points: Language Poetry Remembered Vanishing Points: Language Poetry Remembered
The Grand Piano is a highbrow Friends—a collective history of the early years of Language poetry.
Jan 12, 2011 / Books & the Arts / Barry Schwabsky
Letters Letters
Cruciverbalists Over Easy Berkeley, Calif. I'm a cryptic crossword constructor/editor and a member of a group of two to eight or more that has met weekends since 1982 to solve Frank Lewis's puzzles over breakfast. As an American cryptic crossword constructor, Lewis stood alone: he was in this business far longer than any of us, he constructed more cryptics than any of us and his puzzles were exceptional [Judith Long, "A Puzzler's Puzzler," Dec. 20]. Easy cryptic crosswords limit themselves to a narrow vocabulary and have a rigid cluing style that makes them trivial and, to be honest, boring for experienced solvers. Difficult cryptics are impenetrable to beginners. But Lewis's puzzles have a unique freewheeling quality—he adhered to his own rules, and his clues were the great equalizer, challenging to the experienced and beginners alike. Also, his entries encompassed a vast vocabulary and many areas of knowledge. For these reasons, Lewis's cryptics were ideal for group solving. We often cursed him, but we never got tired of his puzzles. As my cryptic colleague Joshua Kosman put it, Lewis was "candid, ageless at heart and uncannily wise. (5,5)" HENRI PICCIOTTO Boulder, Colo. Ah, the sad state of classical education, even among our heroes. I'm afraid there is confusion in the crossword puzzle of December 20, 1975, reprinted in the December 20, 2010, issue. The answer to 8 down—"Lucius to Horatius, or perhaps East if one is West (6,7)"—is clearly "bridge partner." But Lucius was certainly not that to Horatius. The author confused Publius Horatius Cocles and Lucius Tarquinius Superbus, who were not partners (see Thomas Babington Macaulay's epic poem Horatio at the Bridge, about the classic battle, ca. 505 BC), with Marcus Horatius Barbatus and Lucius Valerius Potitus, who were Roman consuls somewhat later, and might have walked across a bridge together, but are hardly known for it. SIDNEY SHINEDLING ¡No CIR! Jackson, Miss. An addendum to Roberto Lovato's letter in the last issue ["Exchange," Jan. 24]: the biggest problem faced by the Washington advocates of Comprehensive Immigration Reform (CIR) was that they wrote and promoted terrible immigration bills, which have faced widespread rejection by the immigrant communities and workers they were supposed to help. Grassroots groups like the Mississippi Immigrants Rights Alliance (MIRA) that are fighting raids, detentions, deportations and mass firings recoiled from bills that increased enforcement. Nothing, not even withered promises of legalization, could convince activists that more enforcement is a good idea. Last year 400,000 people were deported, and thousands were fired from their jobs. How could the DC lobbyists spearhead a campaign to stop the administration's enforcement policy, when their own bills called for more enforcement? As movement activists sat down at the gates to detention centers, what lobbyists would want to come explain why their bills treated mass detention as a permanent fact of life? From the beginning, the CIR bills refused to address the root causes of migration—the trade agreements and structural adjustment plans that produce high corporate profits in countries like Mexico but force millions of farmers and workers to leave home. CIR advocates sought a strategic alliance with employers based on forcing future migrants into guest-worker or contract labor programs. Since changing trade policy would meet fierce opposition by CIR's employer backers, the DC groups chose to ignore these root causes. The CIR bills failed because they lacked popular support. Yet major foundations poured millions of dollars into those failed efforts while grassroots movements everywhere scratched around for resources to fight deportations, firings, guest-worker abuses, local anti-immigrant legislation and bad trade policy. A social movement for immigration reform isn't built by legislative strategists in Washington. It comes from people fighting in communities all over the country. They can and will make possible tomorrow what's considered politically impossible today. Fortunately, outside DC many organizations have clear alternatives to the CIR bills. The Dignity Campaign has one detailed proposal. Community2Community has been organizing dialogues throughout Washington State to formulate another. The Binational Front of Indigenous Organizations makes its own proposal for progressive reform for the United States while advocating the "right to not migrate" in Mexico. In Mississippi, MIRA pioneered a coalition of African-American and immigrant communities, fighting the racists to a standstill in our legislature while advocating a rights-based reform. The CIR bills and the strategy behind them are dead, at least for a while. It's time to listen to people building the movement outside Washington. BILL CHANDLER, executive director Mississippi Immigrants Rights Alliance In Orbit Santa Cruz, Calif. I am so grateful for Marilynne Robinson's brilliant essay on William James ["Risk the Game," Dec. 13]. I had not read James since my college days and had forgotten the enormous pleasure of being awarded a meaningful position in the bewildering universes of thought and the cosmos. Reading Robinson's exquisite presentation of James's thought has filled me with a kind of joy and release that, at nearly 80 years of age, I had not expected to feel again from the written word. I will now reread James with more love and comprehension. JAN HARWOOD It's a Bone! It's a Bane! It's... Juneau, Alaska Re the verse inspired by Calvin Trillin's deadline poem on John Boehner ["Letters," Jan. 3; Nov. 29]: I'm reminded yet again of the liar's gift for corrupting language. The clown's name is BONER, no matter how long he pretends it's BANER. More doublespeak in days of universal deceit. As Orwell knew, "truth-telling is a revolutionary act." KARL SCHOEPPE (pronounced Shep-ee) Back to the Future A production error caused a random "2" to appear in Elaine Blair's "Trakt Marks" in last week's issue. Ian Frazier returned to Siberia in 1999, not 12999.
Jan 12, 2011 / Our Readers
Puzzle No. 1617 Puzzle No. 1617
This puzzle originally appeared in the January 31, 1976, issue.
Jan 12, 2011 / Frank W. Lewis
Little Pick Eye Little Pick Eye
Little Pick Eye turned William over like the boots his mama left in the hall. Stupid pickle gulls pulled the hair out of his head. Call him kid flower and I guess over time stiffened and plucked is how you might describe him. The main thing to remember is that it's not your fault. You didn't introduce him to the cigar. You didn't give him a hottie tottie when he got froze outa school and you aint gonna straighten him out with a crowbar now. Dogs dancing with their big old teeth, bars a shakin, neighbors scramin neighbors. You pay good money to live somewhere and then wammo, God makes it snow all over your car. Odds are bad you called for advice but advice is what you're gonna get: Work to be the bastard Live to be the bastard And then be the bastard That, or they'll take your money right out of the bank in front of your eyes and tell ya about it. Now Git. Now Git! Now Git! You didn't make it, we just gave it to you for something you did.
Jan 12, 2011 / Books & the Arts / Joshua Beckman
The Violence of the Broken Economy The Violence of the Broken Economy
A lot of people have talked this week about violent political rhetoric bringing the US to a fever pitch, but there's something else keeping people on edge: that's economic catastro...
Jan 12, 2011 / Laura Flanders