Today's Internets.

Show Me Your License, Daddy-O - Reason.com: "The story of the cabaret card illustrates how small men with a little bit of power can inhibit creative expression, stifle artistic growth, and humiliate individual citizens, all in the name of the “public good.”

...In 1926, New York City passed the Cabaret Law, legislation intended not only to curb the growing influence of the Prohibition-fueled mob but also to preserve the morality of innocent people who might fall sway to the shady characters of the night scene. (As the Alderman’s Committee suggested in its report on the bill: “the ‘wild’ stranger and the foolish native should have the check-reign applied a little bit.”) The Cabaret Law required a special license for any establishment offering “any musical entertainment, singing, dancing, or other similar amusement” in connection with food or drink service. This broad definition of cabaret would apply to just about any entertainment venue other than formal theaters and concert halls. There was, unsurprisingly, an exception made for large, lucrative hotels.

...By 1941, a full regimen of fingerprints, photographs, and police interviews was required for all performers wishing to perform in a New York City nightclub.

More than just a barrier to work, the cabaret card for beboppers was an impediment to self-expression and artistic fulfillment. While originating in nightclubs, bebop represented something much more than bar music. The color line had not been broken in American symphony orchestras, so for a young black musician at a prestigious music conservatory—Miles Davis at Julliard, for example—sharing a cramped stage in a 52nd Street nightclub with someone like Charlie Parker was the highest realization of artistic ambition. But before he could do so, a musician would have to be judged not just by lauded masters and discerning aficionados but by the police. "

WIL WHEATON dot TUMBLR

Is America Training Too Many Foreign Armies? - By John Norris | Foreign Policy: "Gen. Carter Ham, the head of the U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM), made an unusually blunt admission last week regarding the failure of U.S. military training to instill respect for human rights in a Malian army now accused of massacring Arabs and Tuaregs as it fights its way north into rebel-held territory. "We didn't spend probably the requisite time focusing on values, ethics, and a military ethos," Ham acknowledged, saying that most U.S. training for the Malians focused on tactics, strategy, and "technical matters." 

 ...In looking at the patterns of U.S. military assistance the question is not who gets American military aid, but who doesn't. In 2012 the United States delivered bilateral security assistance to 134 countries -- meaning that every country on Earth had about a 75 percent chance of receiving U.S. military aid. Once you weed out places like North Korea and Vatican City, you are pretty much assured of receiving military aid no matter how large or small your country, no matter how democratic or despotic your regime, no matter how lofty or minimal your GDP."

‘Kill Anything that Moves: The Real American War in Vietnam’ By Nick Turse - The Washington Post: "For the atrocities — many murders of civilians in South Vietnam — were known to the Pentagon brass and the likes of Defense Secretary Melvin Laird and Army Secretary Stanley Resor. Letters were written by soldiers and Marines, investigations were conducted and reports filed. Almost all were suppressed, hidden from public view. My Lai was atypical in scale (400 killed) but not in kind, and the military knew it. Turse takes us through many of these atrocities, large and small, to document the malignancy growing inside the U.S. armed forces.

Particularly striking is Operation Speedy Express, conducted in the Mekong Delta by the 9th Infantry Division under the command of Maj. Gen. Julian Ewell. Turse documents the savagery of Speedy Express, the gratuitous execution of thousands of civilians in pursuit of high body counts and career advancement. Thousands of dead Vietnamese, claimed by Ewell and his cohort to be Viet Cong guerrillas, were found with very few weapons. The Army was fully aware of what Ewell was doing, and rewarded him with a third star and a prestigious place at the Paris peace negotiations.

...in the case of war, there’s little evidence that the public wants to know more about atrocities, much less act upon them. British scholar Kendrick Oliver made this argument brilliantly in his book on My Lai, showing how reactions to revealed atrocities follow a pattern that ultimately leads to a rally-round-the-troops phenomenon. One could contend that war, by its very nature — and not just in Vietnam and Cambodia, but in Korea, Iraq and Afghanistan — similarly leads to indifference to civilian suffering or even to blaming the victims."

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Can Medical Tourism Save Us From Obamacare? - Reason.com: "The globalization of health care means countries are specializing in certain kinds of care. Turkey excels in pediatric cardiology. Singapore is a destination for oncological care. Chinese heart patients needing top-notch angioplasty go to Japan. Israel and Barbados excel in fertility treatment. Costa Rica and Hungary have become dentistry destinations. Thailand excels in a wide range of specialties thanks in part to its renowned Bumrungrad International Hospital, which serves 400,000 foreign patients a year."

Obama's non-closing of GITMO, kind NYT headlines, and US government irony | Glenn Greenwald | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk: "The New York Times' Charlie Savage reported yesterday that the State Department "reassigned Daniel Fried, the special envoy for closing the prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, and will not replace him". That move obviously confirms what has long been assumed: that the camp will remain open indefinitely and Obama's flamboyant first-day-in-office vow will go unfulfilled. Dozens of the current camp detainees have long been cleared by Pentagon reviews for release - including Adnan Farhan Abdul Latif, a 36-year-old Yemeni who died at the camp in September after almost 11 years in a cage despite never having been charged with a crime. Like so many of his fellow detainees, his efforts to secure his release were vigorously (and successfully) thwarted by the Obama administration."