Author: hankkalet

Tomorrow’s South Brunswick Post will feature stories on:

• How students and coaches feel about a new state plan to test athletes for steroids
• A local Scout collecting books for the South Brunswick Family YMCA as part of an Eagle Scout project
• An update on lockdown drills at township schools
• The county and state farmland preservation programs
• A student’s call to ban smoking at township parks
• How local restaurants are fairing with the state ban on smoking in eateries
• How the two Democratic mayoral candidates feel about open space preservation and the township budget

And my Dispatches column, on gas prices and their impact on the average driver.

Channel Surfing, The South Brunswick Post, The Cranbury Press

This is from Juan Cole’s Informed Comment site (which I highly recommend):

The Iraqi Civil War took the lives of another 42 persons on Tuesday. The most horrible attack was in the Shaab district of the capital. Drivers of two minibuses attacked a market. The first shot 7 persons down, then when a crowd gathered, a second minibus driver detonated his payload near a petroleum truck. The truck became a fireball, killing another 17 Iraqis and wounding at least 38. (Aljazeera is reporting the death toll from this attack at over 40.)

“At least 17 Iraqis were killed in other attacks in and around the capital and two police officers shot dead in the northern oil hub of Kirkuk.

A US soldier was killed by a bomb in the south of the capital, the US military said, adding that two soldiers were killed in a similar incident in Balad, north of the capital, the previous day.”

Al-Zaman says that fighting continues between the US military and guerrillas in Ramadi, with 12 dead and 12 wounded on Tuesday.

Yet, as the folks in Washington seem to want us to believe, things are going swimmingly.

Channel Surfing, The South Brunswick Post, The Cranbury Press

Some new music worth a listen:

1. Jolie Holland, Springtime Can Kill You (Anti-): This is the album that Norah Jones would have recorded if she had soul and grit and a willingness to do more than create a nice AOR curio. Holland’s voice has an elusive quality, something I can’t quite explain, a catch or a slight warble that both sweetens and darkens the music. This disc won’t make you dance, but it will make you smile and cry and pause to take a look around you.

2. Gomez, How We Operate (ATO): Gomez bends genres effortlessly, though subtly, pushing through softer roots-rock and folk into Beatle-esque pop and some jangly, early-REM-ish sounds. It is a lush, confident set. Allmusic.com describes is this way: “This is the sound of a band sitting around facing one another and concentrating on writing and executing songs that stand the test of time, using multiple songwriters of equal gift and merit.” Hard to argue.

By the way, the title track to the Gomez disc was featured prominently on Grey’s Anatomy on Sunday, which is where I first heard it. Even if the show was not so good (yes, it is probably my favorite TV drama these days), the soundtrack makes it worth watching.

Channel Surfing, The South Brunswick Post, The Cranbury Press

Tom Moran’s interview with former state Senate President John Lynch in today’s Star-Ledger, while relatively short, offers some useful insight into the former powerbroker’s mindset — and all that is wrong with New Jersey politics. There is a willful arrogance in his responses that I’ve encountered from far too many powerful politicians in the state. And his unwillingness to see why his connection to Monroe Mayor Richard Pucci — while legal — would have at least the appearance of impropriety underscores the lack of understanding that most politicians have of the pay-to-play issue.

Channel Surfing, The South Brunswick Post, The Cranbury Press

This useful and horrifying chart from The New York Times reminds us that the victims of the Iraq war are not always including in the body counts.

Channel Surfing, The South Brunswick Post, The Cranbury Press