Don't touch those words: Bush and "Criminal Editing"



Bush creates a new national security violation: "criminal editing." I break the law. Stet me, baby.

You've heard about "trading with the enemy" . . . . welcome to the next phase of Bushmania . . . editing with the enemy!

From the New York Times:

February 28, 2004

Treasury Department Is Warning Publishers of the Perils of Criminal Editing of the Enemy
By ADAM LIPTAK


riters often grumble about the criminal things editors do to their prose. The federal government has recently weighed in on the same issue — literally.

It has warned publishers they may face grave legal consequences for editing manuscripts from Iran and other disfavored nations, on the ground that such tinkering amounts to trading with the enemy.

Anyone who publishes material from a country under a trade embargo is forbidden to reorder paragraphs or sentences, correct syntax or grammar, or replace "inappropriate words," according to several advisory letters from the Treasury Department in recent months.

Adding illustrations is prohibited, too. To the baffled dismay of publishers, editors and translators who have been briefed about the policy, only publication of "camera-ready copies of manuscripts" is allowed.

The Treasury letters concerned Iran. But the logic, experts said, would seem to extend to Cuba, Libya, North Korea and other nations with which most trade is banned without a government license.

Laws and regulations prohibiting trade with various nations have been enforced for decades, generally applied to items like oil, wheat, nuclear reactors and, sometimes, tourism. Applying them to grammar, spelling and punctuation is an infuriating interpretation, several people in the publishing industry said. [Etc.]

So . . I'm gonna break the law. Here's a poem by Cuban poet, Nicolas Guillen, a writer celebrated by Castro and the Revolution:

"Bars"

I love those bars and taverns
by the sea,
where people chat and drink
merely to drink and chat.
Where John Nobody goes and asks
for his favourite drink,
where you’ll find John Rowdy and John Blade
and John Nosey and even John
Simple, that’s all, simply
John.

There the white wave
foams in friendship,
the friendship of the people, without rhetoric,
a wave of “Hey there!” and “How ya doin’?”
There is a smell of fish,
Of mangroves, of rum, of salt,
And sweaty shirts hung in the sun to dry.

Look for me, hermano--
in Havana, Oporto, Jacmel, Shanghai--
.....with the ordinary people.

.....Look for me, merely,
.....to drink and chat
.....without rhetoric
.....by the sea.



Okay Donny, Johnny, Tommy, and Georgie . . . come and git me . . .

Posted: Mon - March 1, 2004 at 10:23 AM      

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