BARBWIRE
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ANDREW BARBANO
Pirate Laureate of the High Desert Outback of the American Dream
The Barbwire Molly Ivins Memorial Columniator Hall of Flames

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SITE NAVIGATION TIPS: When all else fails, read the instructions (A favorite John Hanks aphorism I've been using for decades)

Je Suis Charlie
"Our republic and its press will rise or fall together." — Joseph Pulitzer

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Andrew Barbano Editor/Publisher
Photo: Debra Reid, Sparks Tribune

 


   Everybody knows the dice are loaded.
Everybody rolls with their fingers crossed.
   Everybody knows the war is over.
Everybody knows the good guys lost.
   Everybody knows the fight was fixed.
The poor stay poor, the rich get rich.
   That's how it goes. Everybody knows...
Everybody knows the scene is dead
   But there's gonna be a meter on your bed
That will disclose
   What everybody knows...
   Everybody talking to their pockets.
Everybody wants a box of chocolates
   and a long red rose.
   Everybody knows. Everybody knows.
That's how it goes. Everybody knows.

By Leonard Cohen (1934-2016) & Sharon Robinson
© 1988 CBS Records, Inc.


I hope you understand I just had to go back to the island.
— Leon Russell, 1942-2016

 

Betty J. Barbano
2-7-1941 / 12-27-2005
 Remember her laughter

On January 16, 1959, two babies were born.
They became sisters in both life and death.

Larry Barbano, Frater Mei
12-18-1947 / 10-18-2023

UPDATE: WORLDWIDE LEADER? ACT OF GOD OR JUST A GARDEN-VARIETY IMPOSSIBLE DREAMER? ALL OF THE ABOVE? VERY POSSIBLY. Was Andrew Barbano the only advocate for an American pope? Google apparently says YES! At minimum, the Barbwire stumped and broke Google trying to find out. See for yourself. And please lemme know what you think.

Big news. Prayers answered: Pope takes on T-Rump head-to-head.

Hope you and yours enjoyed Happy High Holly Days
Christmas/Kwanzaa/Solstice/Festivus/Chanukah/Thanksgibleting
Feliz Navidad, próspero año y felicidad
HAPPY NEW YEAR / Feliz Año Nuevo / Felice Anno Nuovo
Frohe Weihnachten und beste Wuensche fuer 2026

Venezuela is Spanish for Vietnam
Barbwire by Andrew Quarantino Barbáno/ Expanded from the Sparks Tribune 1-7-2026/ UPDATED 1-9-2026 / Expansions in blue

Might makes right
And till they've seen the light
They've got to be protected
All their rights respected
Till somebody we like can be elected

Members of the corps
We hate the thought of war
We'd rather kill them off by peaceful means
Stop calling it aggression
We hate that expression!

We only want the world to know
That we support the status quo
They love us everywhere we go
So when in doubt
Send the Marines!
                  — Tom Lehrer 1965

Be careful what you wish for: "You wanted an exotic and exciting Caribbean cruise for our anniversary, you got it."



Greatest Hits Dept.

BREAKING NEWS—>

BOXCARS!
Barbwire wins 12th Nevada Press Association award

Hi yo Silver 2025
3-12-2025
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7-31-2025 Barbwire Winner
Congratulations to Barbwire nominee Norman Cardoza, 1977 Pulitzer Prize winner, Reno Gazette-Journal

2024 Barbwire Winners!

Jake Highton & Guy Louis Rocha 2024 honorees BUENO!

Barbwire nominee Dennis Myers elected to NPA Hall of Fame (2019)

WE WON: BIG NEWS FROM THE NEVADA PRESS ASSOCIATION CONFAB IN GOMORRAH SOUTH —> BARBWIRE NOMINEE GUY RICHARDSON INDUCTED INTO HALL OF FAME ON FIRST BALLOT (2012)

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Barbwire wins 11th Nevada Press Association award

GOLD 2017-18

2018 First-Place Winners
From the depths of despair to the den of iniquity & holy of holies

"Excellent work. These are some of the most moving columns I've read."
— NPA contest judge/9-29-2018

The Grasshopper and
the Dragonfly
9-6-2017

Kicked off the Ledge
4-18-2017

NATIONAL NEWS FIRST-BREAK
Back to the Future in
Mississippi West Nevada
10-18-2017

Gold 2017
Don't ask Renown Med for marijuana to help your chemo
10-4-2016
We Don't Need No Education
Toxic turf threat ignored
12-13-2016
Kate Smith & Lady Gaga
2-14-2017

Bronze 6-pack
In the Uber-Nevada legislature, words can kill
4-28-2015
On artificial turf, don't breathe unless absolutely necessary (above)
11-24-2015
Leading questions, lead-headed leaders
1-19-2016

Hopelessly trying to win an earthquake
4-18-2013
2013 Loony Tunes Legislative Lexicon
5-30-2013
The politics of media ga-ga boosterism
3-20-2014

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Barbwire.TV:
15-year overnight success
Daily Sparks Tribune 2-10-2008

The Barbwire's Greatest Hits
BEATING LUSH RAMBO AT HIS OWN GAME: Highlights from radio days
mp3 file

The Dean's List

   The Dean of Reno Bloggers could very well be Andrew Barbano, self-described "fighter of public demons," who started putting his "Barbwire" columns online in 1996 and now runs 10 sites.

RENO NEWS & REVIEW, 11-9-2006

Tomorrow's news today —> Subscribe to Barbwire Confidential
TOP SECRET— HushHush!

 

Did our madcap president get a major Wall Street bank to sponsor a war?
I have suspicious evidence on my desk.

At first, I was shocked when I saw the glossy full-color photo wrapped around the Dec. 28 Sunday NYTimes on my doorstep. It showed a tiny speedboat on the ocean at night under menacing clouds. How many of those have we seen since last September — just before the missiles hit?

I then noticed a Capital One logo at the top. A bank promoting a war? Below the fold was a credit card photo above an ironic cut line: "Easy to use premium travel benefits at a price that makes sense."

Well, all those little boats off Venezuela have indeed paid the ultimate price.

But who would want a credit card for travel to a war zone? Whose crazy idea was this?

The Sunday Times thus delivered a new definition of targeted advertising. By one estimate, a Times wrap-around costs $1.4 million. Peanuts in a war budget. (I foolishly sent the editor a letter about this media mangle but nobody messes with big advertisers.)

Did Capital One Bank get a White House tip about the Venezuela War in order to have a current events tie-in? Call me in 50 years when the National Archives release the documents. [UPDATE: BigOil companies got a briefing, Congress did not.]

Meanwhile, we wallow in the rising waters of a swamp stinking of fascism engulfing us with the stench of dictatorship.

To President Bulsha Tartist, it was just another highly-rated TV show where he served as executive producer. Kinda like January 6, only with multi-million dollar fireworks.

He followed up by threatening invasions of Colombia, Mexico, Cuba and Greenland, the latter igniting war with Denmark and NATO.

We've seen this show before. Does anyone remember how we got into our last jungle wars? (Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia)

Former U.S. resident (1912-1913) Ho Chi Minh had just liberated Viet Nam from the Japanese and was preparing his army to fight alongside the United States to finish the job on Japan when nukes ended WW2.

Ho was making a speech to a huge crowd in 1945 when they were silenced by the sound of an approaching plane. As one, they broke into cheers when they saw American markings. Ho and his countrymen loved America.

French fop Charles de Gaulle had other ideas. The Michelin Tire and Rubber Co. wanted its Viet Nam rubber plantations back. The U.S. caved and the French took over their former colony. Ho kicked them out after the disastrous 1954 battle of Dien Bien Phu. Red-scared America took over the war for the next 21 years.

About the same time, British Petroleum wanted its Iranian oil refinery back after it was nationalized by a democratically elected president. The Brits lied to the Eisenhower administration that Iran was going commie. So the Dulles brothers staged a coup, installed the bloody Shah who was deposed in the late 70s and here we are today.

The Venezuela coup has all the markings of being another bastard child of both the Iran and Viet Nam debacles.

Now comes news that Putin and T-Rump actually discussed a deal during the Orange Crusher's first term wherein the Russians would abandon Venezuela if the U.S. would play hands-off with Ukraine. Looks like that deal with the devils is finally being perpetrated.

DANISH PATSIES. I'd be in favor of taking over Greenland if the Danes agree to exhume and assume Texas and Florida. We might also negotiate for Alabama and Mississippi to bitterly sweeten the deal.

Anything to finally wash out the bad aftertaste of the Confederacy.

NOBEL PRIZE WINNER PAUL KRUGMAN on January 6: "Day of Infamy —> I have to acknowledge this horrible anniversary. Five years ago Donald Trump tried to overthrow an election he lost. He failed and I assumed that the threat was over. Never in my worst nightmares did I imagine that he would make a comeback and return to the White House. But there he is. And he’s every bit as bad as his opponents and critics warned he would be...

"We should be clear about what is happening. American fascism is on the march, and anyone who balks at saying that clearly, who makes excuses and pretends that Trump and the people he brought in aren’t monsters, is deeply unpatriotic. If we are to have a chance at saving democracy, our first duty must be clarity. No sanewashing, no bothsidesing. Only facing the horrible truth can set us free."

ADIOS DONDO. In the same damned week that we will lose Stephen Colbert, my fellow radio dinosaur Dondo Darue is calling it a career after 45 years, 35 of them hooting. His venerable "Risky Biscuit Hayseed Hoot" will say adios May 30 on KUNR fm-88.7, 8:00-10:00p.m. You can reach him on Facebook. Tell him the Barbwire sent you by.

IN NEXT WEEK'S BARBWIRE —> : Dirty commie liberal socialist progressive waltz-dancing PBS dares to advocate for peace from Hitler's hometown.

Get the latest boosters, protect yourself and your family by masking up, continue praying for the oppressed, unenlightened and unvaccinated as well as Popes Leo and Francis, the Dalai Lama, Ukraine, Gaza, Sudan, Ethiopia and the world's more than 160 currently war-torn lands, including ours.

¡Sí se puede! Or, as they say in Poland, SOLIDARNOSC!

Be well. Raise hell. / Esté bien. Haga infierno. (Pardon my Spanglish.)
être bien, élever l'enfer (Pardon my French.) Stammi bene. Scatenare l'inferno. (And Italian.)

Andrew Quarantino Barbano is a 57-year Nevadan and editor of NevadaLabor.com, SenJoeNeal.org, DoctorLawyerWatch.com, BallotBoxing.US,ConsumerCoalitionv.org,ChantalCoalition.org, Rentvolution.org, MississippiWestNV.org and CesarChavezNevada.com among others. He is a longtime member and former vice-president of the Reno-Sparks NAACP and a member Sparks-based Communications Workers of America Local 9413/AFL-CIO. As always, his comments are entirely his own. Barbwire by Barbano has originated in the Sparks Tribune since August 12, 1988. His first byline in the paper came in 1973.

The Northern Nevada Central Labor Council/AFL-CIO inducted him into the César Chávez Nevada Labor Hall of Fame on April 5, 2024.

Breaking News —> Masks work!

And the plague is rampant once again. Be very afraid.

Trump Victory Would Be a Public Health Disaster
By Whistleblower Rick Bright/New York Times/10-10-2024

The 2025 Barbwire Blue-footed Booby Prizes
Barbwire by Andrew Quarantino Barbáno/ Expanded from the Sparks Tribune 12-31-2025/
UPDATED 1-1 & 1-2-2026 / Expansions in blue

The Blue-footed Booby Awards are judged by a committee even more exclusive than the Nobel Prizes. Namely, me.

First, meet our namesakes. Said booby is a marine bird resembling a long-beaked seagull with webbed feet wider than a duck's. Bright baby-blue footsies.

The booby's vivid paddles "play a key role in its mating display," according to bird watchers, "a sexually selected trait." Politics with a lascivious mating dance. What's not to like?

The booby's distinctive face looks at photographers with a slightly irritated expression bordering on contempt. It conveys "my, you poor human, born so plainly repulsive and useless. No feathers, no wings, no fins, no webbing. How long can such a species survive?"

Herewith, the latest but unfortunately not the last Barbwire Blue-footed Booby Prizes, researching for which we spared every expense, as usual.

     1. NEVADA GOV. GIUSEPPE LUMBAGO gets the win by default from his idol, Czar Donaldov. In 2023, the freshman pol set the record for most legislative torpedoes, eclipsing the old mark set by another Republican, Gov. Veto El Obtusé, now University of Nevada-Reno president.

El Veto at least knew how to win a special legislative session to give away the biggest corporate welfare scam in state history. His $1.4 billion gift to Elon Musk and Tesla became the principal driver of clogging our roads and starving our schools.

This year, Giuseppe tried to break the record. Almost $2 billion for Hollywood studios fell flat on its botoxed face. How can you be so inept as to spend about a million for a special session and not have the votes lobbied up front? He was so over his head that sophomore Assemblymember Selena La Rue Hatch, D-Reno, came within one vote of killing it on the first day. (Barbwire 11-19-2025)

     2. T-RUMP THE TERRIBLE. I placed him second for one reason: He hates to be second at anything. The diss is well-deserved. To chronicle all his depredations, you'd have to build an entire library filled with books he would never read. (Books are soooo 20th Century!)

I will just focus on one, his mania for having the biggest, be it oil reserves (think Venezuela) or impeachments (two, thus far).

Now he wants to build the biggest baddest-ever sitting ducks...er, battleships. Those behemoths became obsolete with the dawn of aircraft carriers. (See the movie "Sink the Bismarck.")

Another megalomaniac ordered construction of the biggest war weapons ever, including tanks so large that no roads could accommodate them. Steel sitting ducks, indeed.

Lemme see, what was his name? Oh yeah, Adolf Schicklgruber, aka Hitler.

     3. CBS. The former Tiffany of Networks lived up to its nickname. Truman Capote's "Breakfast at Tiffany's" was about a high-priced prostitute.

T-Rump's price for pushing the stalled CBS takeover by a corporate octopus entailed cancellation of Stephen Colbert's number one late-night show. And apparently censoring "60 Minutes." Paramount-CBS now wants to gorge on Time-Warner, the bribe for which will be gutting CNN.

     4. THE CITY OF SPARKS "NOT-MY-DEPARTMENT" BUILDING DEPT. which did and has done nothing about those rat-trap apartments on Victorian Blvd. downtown. (Barbwire 11-5-2025)

     5. THE TRUCKEE MEADOWS WATER AUTHORITY which continues to lift not a finger to inform customers that condominium owners may not need water line insurance which duplicates homeowners association coverage. (Barbwire Nevada Press Foundation Award winner, 4-17-2024) Insurance companies are making a ton of money as TMWA gives its customers the finger. (More soon.)

     6. NEVADA U.S. SENATORS CORTEZ-MASTO AND ROSEN, both D, for voting to end the government shutdown and cave on health insurance cost increases. Come January, another government shutdown looms as insurance rates skyrocket. Déjà vu all over again, eh wot?

     7. MACHINE GUN MICHELE FIORE, my Italian fantasy girl who leads a charmed life. The non-lawyer MAGA moonhowler, defrocked as a Nye County judge after a felony conviction, was pardoned by her favorite president. She now wants her old job back. She's a literal blue booby winner. Photos proving so will be linked to the Barbwire web edition at NevadaLabor.com/ (Barbwire 3-10-2015 and many others. Websearch "nevadalabor.com fiore" and see what you get. Wotta lotta.)

Welcome back, amor mei.

     8. BUTT-UGLY AND DEPRESSING CRACKERBOX APARTMENT HOUSES sprouting like weeds throughout Sparks-Reno-Washoe. Apparently the architects who designed Cold War East Berlin have found work. Where the hell is ICE when deportation is so richly deserved?

     9. VACCINE DENIERS, one of whom just gave Washoe County its first case of measles since 2018. The old baby killer is back with a vengeance and T-Rump's government doesn't give a rat's ass. If they need one, check out those Victorian Blvd. apartments.

     10. SINCLAIR PSEUDO-FOX BROADCASTING, operators of local TV channels KRXI FOX-11, Nevada Sports Net KNSN-21 and KRNV formerly known as NBC TV-4. A few weeks ago, they moved liberal-ish NBC-4 to 11.2 for the underclass like me who refuse to pay for programs on publicly-owned airwaves. Sinclair, which runs over 200 stations, severely juggled dial positions for a passel of local signals and promised that pay TV households would see no difference. (Barbwire 12-3-2025). That didn't last long.

Last Sunday, I got a call from a distraught Spectrum cable customer who could not get the 49ers-Bears game on NBC-4. I told her to try channel 3 or 118, where Sinclair just moved them.

Corporate America, now well into its third century of treating customers with contempt.

     DISHONORABLE MENTIONS. Georgia Republican congresscritter Marjorie Taylor-Green who has made a big deal of resigning after exactly five years in the US House. Exactly when lifetime insurance and retirement benefits kick in. Crocodile tears.

Speaking of insurance, are you sick of those Colonial Penn life insurance ads that say you can never be canceled once you start handing them money? Hmmm...try not paying monthly premiums and see what happens.

As the late great R-rated comedienne Rusty Warren once sang, bounce your boobies.

Hope you and yours enjoyed Happy High Holly Days.

Get the latest boosters, protect yourself and your family by masking up, continue praying for the oppressed, unenlightened and unvaccinated as well as Popes Leo and Francis, the Dalai Lama, Ukraine, Gaza, Sudan, Ethiopia and the world's more than 160 currently war-torn lands, including ours.

¡Sí se puede! Or, as they say in Poland, SOLIDARNOSC!

Be well. Raise hell. / Esté bien. Haga infierno. (Pardon my Spanglish.)
être bien, élever l'enfer (Pardon my French.) Stammi bene. Scatenare l'inferno. (And Italian.)

Andrew Quarantino Barbano is a 57-year Nevadan and editor of NevadaLabor.com, SenJoeNeal.org, DoctorLawyerWatch.com, BallotBoxing.US,ConsumerCoalitionv.org,ChantalCoalition.org, Rentvolution.org, MississippiWestNV.org and CesarChavezNevada.com among others. He is a longtime member and former vice-president of the Reno-Sparks NAACP and a member Sparks-based Communications Workers of America Local 9413/AFL-CIO. As always, his comments are entirely his own. Barbwire by Barbano has originated in the Sparks Tribune since August 12, 1988. His first byline in the paper came in 1973.

The Northern Nevada Central Labor Council/AFL-CIO inducted him into the César Chávez Nevada Labor Hall of Fame on April 5, 2024.

Breaking News —> Masks work!

And the plague is rampant once again. Be very afraid.

Trump Victory Would Be a Public Health Disaster
By Whistleblower Rick Bright/New York Times/10-10-2024

UPDATE: WORLDWIDE LEADER? ACT OF GOD OR JUST A GARDEN-VARIETY IMPOSSIBLE DREAMER? ALL OF THE ABOVE? VERY POSSIBLY. Was Andrew Barbano the only advocate for an American pope? Google apparently says YES! At minimum, the Barbwire stumped and broke Google trying to find out. See for yourself. And please lemme know what you think.

Let it Be: An American Pope Francis2
Barbwire by Andrew Quarantino Barbáno / Expanded from the Sparks Tribune 4-23-2025, uploaded 4-22-2025

Pinky & the Brain taking over the world
Barbwire by Andrew Quarantino Barbáno / Expanded from the Sparks Tribune 4-2-2025

Ain't we a pair?
Dennis Myers & Andrew Barbano inducted into César Chávez Nevada Labor Hall of Fame
Barbwire by Andrew Quarantino Barbáno / Expanded from the Sparks Tribune 4-10-2024

Betty J. Barbano
2-7-1941 / 12-27-2005
 Remember her laughter

On January 16, 1959, two babies were born.
They became sisters in both life and death.

Larry Barbano, Frater Mei
12-18-1947 / 10-18-2023
To Die For
My daughters were born 65 years ago yesterday. Alas, their youth was cut in twain.
Barbwire by Andrew Quarantino Barbáno / Expanded from the Sparks Tribune 1-17-2024
 

Web Xtras & Smoking Guns—>

Why the science is clear that masks work
By Zeynep Tufecki / The New York Times / 3-10-2023

Breaking News —> Masks work!

And the plague is rampant once again. Be very afraid.

Trump Victory Would Be a Public Health Disaster
By Whistleblower Rick Bright/New York Times/10-10-2024
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Peruse the Underbelly of the News —> Subscribe to Barbwire Confidential

For all the news you never knew you needed to know 'til now: Tell your friends and friendly enemies to subscribe to Barbwire Confidential for warm laughter, cheap thrills, hot scoops and occasional cold logic at BallotBoxing.US/ Cheap at twice the price. (Hush Hush!)

Barbwire dark foreshadowings unfortunately have a way of becoming reality. I thus suggest inoculation by signing onto the HushHush! list at BallotBoxing.US/ It's cheap as well as enlightening entertainment. Thank you kindly for your support.



$75 dead or alive: Still crazy after all these years
A mass murderer becomes famous on TV a century later
How come nobody noticed 'til now?
Barbwire by Andrew Barbáno / Expanded from the 2-21-2018 Sparks Tribune

Triangle Shirtwaist Factory owners Max Blank and Isaac Harris. Is not Mr. Harris eerily familiar to television junkies?
From the Emmy-winning opening slate of the blockbuster "Cheers" television series. Combined with its "Frasier" spinoff, it lasted 20 years.
The "shirtwaist kings" immigrated from Russia and made a fortune manufacturing "Gibson Girl"-style blouses. (Photo, "The American Experience"/PBS)
 The Emmy-winning opening slate of the "Cheers" television series before the "slate" of creators is superimposed. Looks like Mr. Harris' dead ringer (at left) is having a bloody good time.

"Who ya gonna believe, me or your own eyes?" — Chico Marx disguised as Groucho Marx in "Duck Soup" (1933)
Back to the story of the 1911 Triangle Shirtwaist holocaust

Triangle tragedy recalled as requiem
"The Fire in My Mouth," a new oratorio by Pulitzer honoree Julia Wolfe, premiered with the New York Philharmonic Jan. 24
By Michael Cooper / The New York Times 1-23-2019

Wasting workers where everybody knows your name
Barbwire by Andrew Quarantino Barbáno / Expanded from the Sparks Tribune 10-18-2023

SITE NAVIGATION TIPS: When all else fails, read the instructions (A favorite John Hanks aphorism I've been using for decades)

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Copyright © 1982-2026 Andrew Barbano

Andrew Barbano is a 56-year Nevadan, editor of NevadaLabor.com and SenJoeNeal.org; and former chair of the City of Reno's Citizens Cable Compliance Committee. He was the longtime executive producer of Nevada's annual César Chávez Day celebration and has been a quarter-century member and 10- year officer of the Reno-Sparks NAACP. As always, his opinions are strictly his own. E-mail barbano@frontpage.reno.nv.us.

The Northern Nevada Central Labor Council/AFL-CIO inducted him into César Chávez Nevada Labor Hall of Fame on April 5, 2024.

Barbwire by Barbano moved to Nevada's Daily Sparks Tribune on Aug. 12, 1988, and has originated in them parts ever since. His first byline in the paper came in 1973.
Whom to blame: How a hall-of-famer's hunch birthed the Barbwire in August of 1987
Tempus fugit.

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