Merry New Year
It's Monday morning, January 5, 2026, 10:21, and this Web page is finished. I've updated this Web page with the piece we did on the air about Trump's hypocrisy regarding Iran's mistreatment of people who are protesting that awful regime, and I've added the piece about the free E-book I recommended. previously I'd added the poem Pickles of the North had talked about on this program along with some words from Pickles, and I've added a graphic for that segment. I'd also put in a link to the archive for this radio program. I think there's a little more to come. The original top of this page follows the arrow. ⇒ This week I'm in the complete opposite condition from last week. This week I've stayed up and not gotten a nap, and I'm making all sorts of blunders. I think I've fixed some of them now, but it's so difficult when I need more sleep than the deadlines will allow. We talked about more than what's here so far, check back for the updated version of this Web page.
You can now listen to this program on the official WBAI Archive.
The next regular WBAI LSB meeting will be held on Wednesday January 14, 2026, at 7:00 PM. That meeting will be held on ZOOM, even though ZOOM compromises privacy and security.
Some years ago the WBAI LSB voted to hold its regular meetings on the second Wednesday night of every month, subject to change by the LSB, so we have the following schedule:
These meetings are set to begin at 7:00 PM.
WBAI has a program schedule up on its Web site. The site has gotten many of the individual program pages together to provide links and such, so check it out.
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Here is WBAI's current Internet stream. We can no longer tell if the stream is working without testing every possible stream. Good luck.
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WBAI is archiving the programs! WBAI has permanently switched to yet another new archive Web page! This one is more baffling than the previous one. For some time I was unable to post archive blurbs, then I could, and then I couldn't again. Now I can again and there are a whole bunch of archive blurbs up there now.
This is a link to the latest version of the official WBAI archive. The archiving software appears to have been at least partially fixed. To get to the archive of this program you can use the usual method: you'll have to click on the drop-down menu, which says Display,
and find Back of the Book on that menu. We're pretty early in the list, so it shouldn't be too difficult. Once you find the program name click GO
and you'll see only this Back of the Book program. Management has fixed some problems that we'd been having with the archives.
For programs before March 23, 2019, we're all out of luck. The changes that took place once WBAI Management took control of the WBAI archives seems to have wiped out all access to anything before that date in March. You'll have to click on the same drop-down menu as above, which says Display,
and find Specify Date
, it's the second choice from the top. You are then given a little pop-up calendar and you can choose the date of the program there. Then click GO
and you'll see a list of programs that aired on that date. For those previous programs you can get the audio, but nothing else, since I can't post anything to those pages anymore. Good luck.
Since the former General Manager banned Sidney Smith from WBAI he's not alternating with us on the air. As of November 2020, Back of the Book airs weekly.
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We slipped into 2026, this past week. We are now in the second quarter of the 21st Century! These dates all sound like something I'd read in science fiction stories as a kid.
Pickles of the North and I welcomed in the New Year while watching TV, one of the non-network channels, with the sound off. I'm sure that I'll be spending the next couple of months trying to avoid writing 2025,
on everything that needs a date on it. One time a few years ago I made the mistake of writing the previous year on a check in October! I've got to pay more attention in my old age here.
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That oil tanker named the Bella 1 that the Navy and Coast Guard have been pursuing into the Atlantic Ocean is now registered as a Russian ship under the name the Marinera. The United States government forces that are dogging the oil tanker have a seizure warrant for the ship that was issued before the boarding attempt was made a week and a half ago. Donnie Bonespur
Trump can't play his games against the Russians. If he tries to do it he'll lose. Tit for tat could be a game the Russians might play with Trump. Will Trump call his pal Putin about this?
UPDATE: At the start of every program for the past five years and ten months we've noted that, If things have happened between then and when you're hearing this program we won't be referencing them on this program. A recorded program cannot be as up to date as a live program, but this is what we have to do in these dangerous times.
This was illustrated this week when the Trump Administration invaded Venezuela and seized its de facto leader Nicholás Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores after we'd already posted the program. How that's going to affect the Trump Administration's pursuit of the Marinera is an open. question. Things may be clearer by the time we do our next program or they may be even more chaotic. We live in interesting times.
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Donnie Bonespur
Trump is now threatening Iran. He's saying that the United States would come to the aid of protesters in Iran if the government there used lethal force against them. What hypocrisy! Trump has said in the past that he wanted to shoot American protestors in the legs. And he once had police violently clear protestors from around a church in Washington, D.C. so he could do a photo-op in front of that church. Meanwhile I'm very glad that people in Iran are expressing their displeasure with their theocratic, homophobic, misogynistic rulers. I hope that one day they'll overthrow those oppressive religious fanatics. I look forward to getting rid of Trump and his pals in 2029, as well.
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Once again I recommended a free E-book from Project Gutenberg on this program. This time the book was a somewhat whimsical one called Wise-crack Dictionary. Published in 1926, its long sub-title says it contains, More than 1,000 phrases and words in every day use collected from 10,000 communications received during a newspaper prize contest and other sources, a new addition to the American dictionary
. The book contains a snapshot of some of the slang terms adult newspaper editors of the mid-1920s, considered to be up to date and clean enough to avoid prosecution under the Comstock laws, which are still on the books 153 years after they were passed.
Some of these words and phrases I remember from my youth. At least one is thousands of yeas old, and some of these entries make no sense to me, probably because I'm looking at them from a century after the book was published. Here's a small sample of the book's contents, with my comments in square brackets.
bulls.]
You can read the entire Wise-crack Dictionary here. Have fun!
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Pickles here, thinking about all the songs, stories, artwork and poems attributed to Anonymous, those creative persons whose names are lost to us over time. And how sometimes we might think a work just comes out of the ether, especially when it's taught to very young children for decades. Well, Jane Taylor, born in 1783, in England, wrote a poem in her early twenties called The Star
and it was published in a volume titled Poetry for Children in 1806. The poems were written individually by Jane and her older sister Ann. Poetry writing was among their many literary accomplishments, but Jane's poem was set to an old French pastoral tune, whose composer was Anonymous, entitled Ah! Vous Dirai-je, Maman, in a music volume published in 1838. This melody itself was first published in the mid-1700s, in France, and many composers created different arrangements of it, the most famous being Mozart's Twelve Variations of Ah! Vous Dirai-je, Maman. But generations of English speaking kids know the poem and music as Twinkle Twinkle Little Star
, using the first line of Jane's poem The Star
as the title. So thank you, Jane! We won't forget you!
Twinkle, twinkle, little star,
How I wonder what you are!
Up above the world so high,
Like a diamond in the sky.
When the blazing sun is gone,
When he nothing shines upon,
Then you show your little light,
Twinkle, twinkle, all the night.
Then the trav'ller in the dark,
Thanks you for your tiny spark,
He could not see which way to go,
If you did not twinkle so.
In the dark blue sky you keep,
And often thro' my curtains peep,
For you never shut your eye,
Till the sun is in the sky.
'Tis your bright and tiny spark,
Lights the trav'ller in the dark:
Tho' I know not what you are,
Twinkle, twinkle, little star.
Jane Taylor 1806
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There are a lot of issues that are considered hazardous to talk about on the air at WBAI, even though the gag rule was lifted in 2002. However, there is the Internet! There are mailing lists which you can subscribe to and Web based message boards devoted to WBAI and Pacifica issues. Many controversial WBAI/Pacifica issues are discussed on these lists.
One open list that no longer exists was the WBAI-specific Goodlight
Web based message board. It was sometimes referred to on Back of the Book as the bleepin' blue board,
owing to the blue background that was used on its Web pages. This one had many people posting anonymously and there was also an ancillary WBAI people
board that was just totally out of hand.
In June 2012, I ended up having to salvage the bleepin' blue board, and so I was the moderator on it for its last seven years, until it got too expensive.
Sometimes we used to have live interaction with people posting on the Goodlight Board
during the program.
Our very own Uncle Sidney Smith, whose program Saturday Morning With the Radio On used to alternate with us, has a blog these days. You can reach his blog here.
There used to be a number of mailing lists related to Pacifica and WBAI. Unfortunately, they were all located on Yahoo! Groups. When Yahoo! Groups was totally shut down in December 2020, all of those mailing lists ceased to exist. One year earlier their file sections and archives of E-mails, had been excised leaving only the ability to send E-mails back and forth among the members. Now it's all gone. Older Back of the Book program Web pages tell a little more about those lists.
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The contents of this Web page are copyright © 2026, R. Paul Martin.
