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Book Review: Ugly Beauty - Glamour Goes to War

Caroline Weber
The New York Times
Fri, 04 Feb 2011 12:26 UTC
Helena Rubinstein
© Helena Rubinstein FoundationHelena Rubinstein promoted herself as a "beauty scientist."
In 1835, the French novelist Honoré de Balzac observed that "the secret of great fortunes . . . is a forgotten crime." Recast in the English-speaking world as "Behind every great fortune lies a great crime," this truism aptly describes the central conceit of Ruth Brandon's Ugly Beauty. Reconstructing the lives of two self-made beauty tycoons - Helena Rubinstein, the creator of the cosmetics brand, who died in 1965; and Eugène Schueller, the founder of the corporate behemoth L'Oréal, who died in 1957 - Brandon zeroes in on a crime that, in her view, places them in a "potentially lethal opposition" to each other.

The crime in question is Schueller's collaborationist activity during the Nazi occupation of his native France during World War II, activity that books like Monica Waitz­felder's L'Oréal Took My Home: The Secrets of a Theft and Michael Bar-Zohar's Bitter Scent: The Case of L'Oréal, Nazis, and the Arab Boycott have already treated in some detail. But for Brandon, whose previous works include Singer and the Sewing Machine: A Capitalist Romance and Automobile: How the Car Changed Life, the fascist dealings of L'Oréal's chief merit additional exploration because the Polish-born Rubinstein "was a Jew," and because, "in 1988, Schueller's business swallowed Rubinstein's." From this confluence of factors, Brandon tries to produce evidence of a drawn-out, high-drama "standoff between Helena Rubinstein and Eugène Schueller."
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Che Guevara

Pepper-spraying cop accused of abusing Bush protesters in 2004

David Edwaqrds
The Raw Story
Tue, 27 Sep 2011 11:47 UTC
Activists have identified the senior New York Police Department officer who allegedly pepper-sprayed young women at the "Occupy Wall Street" protests, and it's not the first time he has been accused of civil rights abuses.

The Guardian confirmed that the officer is Anthony Bologna, who was also accused of civil rights abuses and false arrest during the 2004 Republican National Convention in New York City.

Photographs of the officer's badge also suggested that Bologna was the person in question.

A file released by the hacker group Anonymous pointed to a 2007 civil rights suit filed against Bologna.

Post A. Posr, the man named as a plaintiff in that suit, was arrested during the 2004 convention although he wasn't actively taking part in the protests.

"Police contend that Posr hit the man with a rolled-up newspaper," Posr lawyer Alan Levine told The Guardian. "He said he was just talking to the guy. Bologna ordered another officer, Camejo, to arrest Posr."
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Che Guevara

Lawrence O'Donnell rips 'unprovoked police brutality' at 'Occupy Wall Street'

Eric W. Dolan
Raw Replay
Tue, 27 Sep 2011 11:42 UTC
MSNBC host Lawrence O'Donnell on Monday condemned the "unprovoked police brutality" that occurred at the "Occupy Wall Street" protest over the weekend. Video recordings showed female protesters being rounded up in an orange-colored mesh pen by police and subsequently sprayed with mace without any provocation, and other protesters being dragged across the street by police.

"The reason that man is being assaulted by the police is because of what he has in his hand," O'Donnell said, while showing a video clip of a man with a video camera being tackled by police. "He's holding a professional grade video camera. Since the Rodney King beating was caught on an amateur video camera, American police officers have known video cameras are their worst enemy. They will do anything they can to stop you from legally videotaping how they handle their responsibility to serve and protect you."

"Everything those cops did this weekend to those protesters they've done to someone else when no video camera was rolling," he later added.

Watch video, courtesy of MSNBC:

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Che Guevara

'Occupy Wall Street' protest slowly spreads across the United States

Eric W. Dolan
The Raw Story
Tue, 27 Sep 2011 11:34 UTC
Image
© Unknown
Small groups of demonstrators in major American cities have started their own "Occupy Wall Street" demonstrations and organizers are planning further actions in more cities across the United States.

A diverse coalition of people have pledged to occupy Wall Street until something is done about corporate greed and the financial system's undemocratic influence on the U.S. government.

The protesters have been camped out in New York's old Liberty Plaza, one block from the Federal Reserve, since Saturday.

"The one thing we all have in common is that We Are The 99 Percent that will no longer tolerate the greed and corruption of the one percent," said a statement on the Occupy Wall Street website.

At least 80 to 100 people were arrested over the weekend in the first big crackdown since the demonstration began. Police accused the protesters of blocking traffic and resisting arrest.

Video recordings showed female protesters being rounded up in an orange-colored mesh pen by police and subsequently sprayed with mace, seemingly without any provocation, and other protesters being dragged across the street by police. Another protester said she was arrested for trying to film the demonstration and locked in a police van for over two hours.
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Ambulance

China: Shanghai Subway Crash Injures Hundreds


National Public Radio / Associated Press
Tue, 27 Sep 2011 11:03 UTC
A Shanghai subway train crashed into another that was stopped underground Tuesday afternoon, injuring more than 210 people in the latest trouble for the rapidly expanded transportation system in China's commercial center.

The crash occurred after Shanghai Shentong Metro Group blogged that line 10 was having delays due to equipment problems. Line 10 opened just last year as one of the city's newest subways.

Image
© AFP/Getty ImagesRescue workers evacuated passengers after a subway train crashed into another train between stations Tuesday in Shanghai.
At least 212 people were hurt, three seriously, the metro operator said. It said none had life-threatening injuries, though some of the injured were carried away on stretchers.

One train rammed into the back of another that was stopped. Reports said problems with signaling equipment had prompted the line to switch to manual operations.
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No Entry

China Clamps Down on Offshore Drilling After Disastrous Spill


SustainableBusiness.com
Mon, 26 Sep 2011 10:20 UTC
oil spill,china
© greenpeace
Oil companies have been put on notice that China is not like the US when it comes to oil spills.

After what China calls a distastrous oil spill off its coast, the country is quickly enacting tough "zero-risk" environmental standards that oil companies say are almost impossible to reach.

In June, US-based ConocoPhillips spilled 3,223 barrels of crude oil and drilling fluids into Bohai Bay, the innermost gulf of the Yellow Sea, in northeast China. Although the spill was halted that month, the company has allowed small amounts to continue leaking.

Did we ever hear about "zero-risk" standards after BP's spill in the Gulf of Mexico? In comparison, the BP Deepwater Horizon spill was the worst in history, leaking 4.9 million barrels into the Gulf of Mexico.
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Eye 2

Italian Propaganda: Amanda Knox is a 'she-devil,' Italian court told

Deepa Babington
Reuters
Mon, 26 Sep 2011 00:00 UTC
Amanda Knox
© Reuters//Giorgio BenvenutiAmanda Knox, the U.S. student convicted of murdering her British flatmate Meredith Kercher in Italy on November 2007, arrives at her appeal trial session in Perugia September 24, 2011.
Amanda Knox is at heart a "she-devil" who loved to play dangerous games, the lawyer for a man falsely accused by the American student of killing her roommate told an Italian court on Monday.

"Amanda is one thing and another -- that is, both Saint Maria Goretti and a satanic, diabolic she-devil given to borderline behavior," Carlo Pacelli said, referring to a Catholic saint linked to purity, young women and rape victims.

Knox and her Italian ex-boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito are appealing their 2009 convictions for the murder of 21-year-old Briton Meredith Kercher during a drug-fueled sexual assault in Perugia in 2007.

The student from Seattle initially accused Congolese bar owner Patrick Lumumba of killing Kercher, whose half-naked body was found with a deep stab wound in the throat.
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Che Guevara

US, Utah: Thousands run through the streets of Salt Lake City in their underwear to protest against Utah 'being so uptight'


The Daily Mail, UK
Mon, 26 Sep 2011 01:22 UTC
When thousands of people took to the streets of Salt Lake City in their underwear, they were not just hoping to break records.

Wearing just boxers, panties and bras, are the crowds of people said they were there to break stereotypes.

Salt Lake City is the home of the Mormon church, which is a vocal opponent of gay marriage and a bastion of conservatism.
Image
© The Associated PressCool runnings: Wearing very little, around 3,000 people took part in the Salt Lake City Utah Undie Run
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Handcuffs

Hundreds Face Arrest in Canada Pipeline Protest

Michel Comte
Agence France-Presse
Mon, 26 Sep 2011 12:15 UTC
protest,canada,pipeline
© Agence France-Presse/Michel ComtePolice move in to arrest demonstrators who breeched a barricade during a protest in front of Canadian Parliament
Ottawa - Dozens were arrested Monday for storming Canada's Parliament to protest Ottawa's support for a proposed pipeline to bring oil from Canada's tar sands to the US Gulf Coast.

And up to 200 more arrests were expected as scores of environmentalists and aboriginals lined up to breach a police barricade around the neo-Gothic building and hold a sit-in inside.

"The tar sands represent a path of broken treaties, eroded human rights, catastrophic climate change, poisoned air and water and the complete stripping of Canada's morality in the international community," said Clayton Thomas-Muller of the Indigenous Environmental Network.
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Cult

US: Alabama town to offenders "Go to church or go to jail"

David Edwards
Raw Story
Mon, 26 Sep 2011 15:35 UTC
Image

The small town of Bay Minette, Alabama is telling people convicted of small crimes to choose Jesus or choose jail.

Starting this week, the city judge will implement Operation Restore Our Community (ROC), which gives misdemeanor offenders a choice between fines and jail or a year of Sunday church services.

"Operation ROC resulted from meetings with church leaders," Bay Minette Police Chief Mike Rowland told the Alabama Press-Register. "It was agreed by all the pastors that at the core of the crime problem was the erosion of family values and morals. We have children raising children and parents not instilling values in young people."
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