Recommended Reading
from Bruce
President Obama tells the story of PFLAG (YouTube)
President Obama shared the story of PFLAG--Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays--as "the story of America" in a speech on October 10, 2009. Learn more about PFLAG's history at www.PFLAG.org.
National Cathedral to perform same-sex weddings (Politico)
The Washington National Cathedral, where the nation gathers to mourn tragedies and celebrate new presidents, will soon begin performing same-sex marriages. Cathedral officials tell The Associated Press the church will be among the first Episcopal congregations to implement a new rite of marriage for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender members.
George Dvorsky: It's official: 2012 was the hottest year ever in the U.S. (io9)
Last year was pretty messed up as far as weather was concerned in the United States, and now we have the numbers to show why. According to the National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C., the average temperature in 2012 was 55.3 degrees Fahrenheit (12.94 degrees Celcius) - an entire degree higher than the previous record.
Mark Morford: Moderation is for Hippies (SF Gate)
It's true, isn't it? Moderation is a joke. Moderation is un-American. Moderation in any healthy, compassionate sense in this year of our extremely hot and imminently riotous 2013 is nothing short of a goddamn modern miracle. Don't you think? Have you noticed? No one believes in it anymore. Fewer still actually practice it. Anyone on any side of a given debate or social issue shun it like it reality TV shuns good taste. Even the planet itself agrees: Extremism is in.
Charlie Jane Anders: All the Essential Science Fiction and Fantasy Books That Are Coming in 2013 (io9)
This year's science fiction books are going to rock. John Scalzi returns to the 'Old Man's War' universe, there's a brand new Neil Gaiman novel, and Stephen King's long-awaited sequel to 'The Shining.' Plus brand new books from Austin Grossman, Nalo Hopkinson, Christopher Priest, Diana Gabaldon, Robert J. Sawyer, Joe Hill... and J.R.R. Tolkien?
Maria Popova: Charles Addams Illustrates Mother Goose, 1967 (BrainPickings)
… imagine my delight upon finding out that in 1967, beloved Addams Family creator and New Yorker cartoonist Charles "Chas" Addams - who was born 101 years ago today - put his twist on the classic Mother Goose tales.
Why You Should Brush Your Teeth When Your House Is Burning Down (The Oatmeal)
"Matthew Inman of 'The Oatmeal' is always funny and witty, but today he published a comic that is simply brilliant. Read about Domino, a cat from his childhood. Inman's storytelling is perfect. I won't spoil it for you. Go and read."-John Farrier of Neatorama
Laurie Fendrich: Dave Hickey's Politics of Beauty (Chronicle of Higher Education)
Everybody, it seems, is writing about Dave Hickey, but nobody's really concentrating on the 74-year-old maverick art critic's thorny, profound ideas about beauty. That is understandable.
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Reader Suggestion
Michelle in AZ
From The Creator of 'Avery Ant'
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Sunny, windy and cold (for these parts).
Humboldt Invitation
Jimmy Kimmel
Humboldt State University in California has invited Jimmy Kimmel to deliver the school's commencement address after he joked about its marijuana research program.
The host of "Jimmy Kimmel Live!" devoted three minutes of his late-night show in November to poking fun at the new program.
Kimmel's faux recruiting commercial said students could look forward to low-pressure careers such as dog walking, organizing drum circles and occupying Wall Street.
Humboldt State President Rollin Richmond and student body president Ellyn Henderson revealed they sent Kimmel a letter last month saying they found parts of the skit funny but thought it unfairly portrayed the campus community as a bunch of pot-obsessed slackers.
Jimmy Kimmel
Abandoning "All-Star" Format
"Dancing With the Stars"
ABC entertainment president Paul Lee summed up his fall season by saying his network has "a lot to shout about, and we also have a lot to do."
Lee's network finished the fall in fourth place in the key 18-49 demographic and third place in total viewers. He lamented the fall's lack of any "big breakout hits on broadcast on any of the networks and on ABC in particular."
Lee assessed his network's fall at a Television Critics Association panel on Thursday. He said he was particularly disappointed not to see better numbers for reality standby "Dancing With the Stars," which adapted an "all-star" format in the fall and brought back former contestants. He said that for its spring cycle, the show would go back to recruiting fresh talent, in hopes of drawing a younger audience.
Looking for a positive spin on the disappointing ratings for the show - which still averages 16 million total viewers per episode - he said the dancing this fall may have been too good.
"It turns out people like to have bad dancing as much as they do good dancing," he said.
"Dancing With the Stars"
Leaving 'Millionaire'
Meredith Vieira
Meredith Vieira is leaving "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire" after 11 years as host of the syndicated game show.
The former "Today" show host and two-time Emmy winner as best game show host said Thursday she's leaving for other ventures including more work at NBC News.
An executive familiar with Vieira's plans says Vieira will be launching her own YouTube channel with stories on people's lives. The executive spoke on condition of anonymity because the plans haven't been announced yet.
Vieira also has her own production company. She produced the feature film "Return" and the touring play "Life in a Marital Institution (20 Years of Monogamy in One Terrifying Hour)."
Meredith Vieira
Exits "X Factor"
Britney Spears
Britney Spears is leaving Fox singing contest "The X Factor," a source close to the show said on Thursday, having failed to turn her star power into ratings success in one season as a judge.
"I can confirm (the news)," said the source, who was not authorized to speak on the record, when asked about media reports of Spears' exit.
Celebrity and television news outlets gave differing reasons for the decision to quit.
Her departure leaves fellow judge and executive producer Simon Cowell searching for a big name and personality to lift the U.S. version of "The X Factor" past its NBC rival, "The Voice," in the ratings.
Spears was recruited to "The X Factor" with a reported $15 million salary after a 14-year singing career that made her one of the biggest pop stars of the 2000s. Reports say she has begun working on her eighth studio album.
Britney Spears
Stays At Warner Bros.
"Superman"
The Man of Steel is staying at Warner Bros.
The studio won a major victory in appeals court on Thursday that maintains its control of the Superman franchise through subsidiary DC Comics.
The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed Warner Bros.' argument that it made a binding deal with the estate of Superman co-creator Jerome Siegel in 2001 compensating the estate in exchange for the studio's continued hold on the copyright to the famous superhero. A federal court had ruled in 2008 that Siegel's estate could reclaim its copyright as part of a law that lets artists undo an earlier deal - provided they wait 35 years.
The appeals court has rejected that ruling because of the settlement reached in 2001, though the estate can appeal to the United States Supreme Court.
The studio had already won a similar battle against the estate of Superman co-creator Joseph Shuster.
"Superman"
Estate Settles Lawsuit
William Faulkner
The estate of William Faulkner has settled a copyright lawsuit against Northrop Grumman Corp. and The Washington Post Co. for using a Faulkner quote in a newspaper ad by the defense contractor.
U.S. District Judge Henry T. Wingate in Jackson dismissed the lawsuit Dec. 12. Terms of the settlement are sealed.
The Faulkner estate sued in 2012 over use of what it said was a quote from a 1956 essay Faulkner wrote in Harper's Magazine. The Independence Day ad in the Post used the phrase: "We must be free; not because we claim freedom, but because we practice it."
The same quote, but with different punctuation, was the conclusion to Faulkner's essay criticizing the South's response to school integration.
William Faulkner
Daddy Dearest
Pola Kinski
A daughter of the late Klaus Kinski, the German actor with the haunted face who starred in epic films like "Fitzcarraldo", has accused him of raping her as a child, over a period of 14 years, in her new book.
"I kept quiet for years because he forbade me from talking about it," Pola Kinski, who is 60, told Stern magazine in an interview published on Thursday.
"The terrible thing is that he once told me that it was completely natural, that fathers all over the world did that with their daughters," she said.
Klaus Kinski, who died in 1991 in California aged 65, was best known for playing manic, obsessive figures for the German director Werner Herzog in films like "Aguirre: the Wrath of God", "Nosferatu the Vampyre" and "Fitzcarraldo" in 1982.
He also appeared in David Lean's "Doctor Zhivago" in 1965 and spaghetti westerns such as "For a Few Dollars More" with Clint Eastwood in 1965.
Pola Kinski
US Life Expectancy
Violence
The United States suffers far more violent deaths than any other wealthy nation, due in part to the widespread possession of firearms and the practice of storing them at home in a place that is often unlocked, according to a report released Wednesday by two of the nation's leading health research institutions.
Gun violence is just one of many factors contributing to lower U.S. life expectancy, but the finding took on urgency because the report comes less than a month after the shooting deaths of 26 people children and women at an elementary school in Newtown, Conn.
The United States has about six violent deaths per 100,000 residents. None of the 16 other countries included in the review came anywhere close to that ratio. Finland was closest to the U.S. ranking with slightly more than two violent deaths per 100,000 residents.
For many years, Americans have been dying at younger ages that people in almost all other wealthy countries. In addition to the impact of gun violence, Americans consume the most calories among peer countries and get involved in more accidents that involve alcohol. The U.S. also suffers higher rates of drug-related deaths, infant mortality and AIDS.
The result is that the life expectancy for men in the United States ranked the lowest among the 17 countries reviewed, at 75.6 years, while the life expectancy for U.S. women ranked second lowest at 80.7 years. The countries reviewed included Canada, Japan, Australia and much of Western Europe.
Violence
Charge To Be Dismissed
Gene Shalit
A misdemeanor driving charge against retired television movie critic Gene Shalit is set to be dismissed in Massachusetts.
The 86-year-old Shalit was cited in October after his vehicle struck a utility pole and came to rest against a house in Lenox, in western Massachusetts. Shalit, who lives in nearby Stockbridge, wasn't hurt. He told police he fell asleep.
The agreement between police and Shalit's lawyer was approved during a probable cause hearing Wednesday in Southern Berkshire District Court. The hearing was continued to April 2, when the driving to endanger charge will be dismissed.
Shalit's lawyer tells The Berkshire Eagle his client won't drive until the next hearing, at which time his driving status will be re-assessed.
Gene Shalit
655 Year Old Crime
Swiss Court
A Swiss court has wiped out an annual debt that farmers have had to pay the Catholic Church to atone for a crime 655 years ago.
Swiss public broadcaster RTS says a court in the northeastern canton (state) of Glarus ruled that the current farm owner no longer has to pay 70 Swiss francs ($76) each year because Swiss mortgage reforms in the mid-19th century made the practice invalid.
The broadcaster reported Tuesday the court sided with the landowner in a dispute with the church after he refused to make the annual payment for oil and candles.
The payments had been a tradition since 1357, when a man named Konrad Mueller killed a man named Heinrich Stucki. To atone, Mueller promised to always pay to keep an eternal lamp lit.
Swiss Court
Top 20
Concert Tours
The Top 20 Concert Tours ranks artists by average box office gross per city and includes the average ticket price for shows in North America. The previous week's ranking is in parentheses. The list is based on data provided to the trade publication Pollstar by concert promoters and venue managers.
1. (1) Barbra Streisand; $4,065,743; $263.52.
2. (2) Madonna; $3,865,832; $172.30.
3. (3) Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band; $1,362,627; $93.95.
4. (4) Justin Bieber; $1,223,584; $75.73.
5. (New) Dave Matthews Band; $967,758; $73.76.
6. (5) Neil Young & Crazy Horse; $855,928; $91.59.
7. (6) The Who; $845,015; $85.86.
8. (7) Rush; $832,838; $82.49.
9. (8) Leonard Cohen; $804,309; $100.16.
10. (10) Red Hot Chili Peppers; $718,124; $59.35.
11. (11) Zac Brown Band; $651,642; $50.30.
12. (12) Trans-Siberian Orchestra; $547,517; $51.54.
13. (14) Carrie Underwood; $530,636; $58.80.
14. (15) Bob Dylan; $457,533; $78.73.
15. (16) Eric Church; $314,904; $40.41.
16. (New) Eddie Vedder; $258,676; $77.16.
17. (17) Jeff Dunham; $250,250; $58.49.
18. (New) The Moody Blues; $160,360; $68.27.
19. (18) Wiz Khalifa; $154,930; $41.61.
20. (19) Tobymac; $143,389; $27.82.
Concert Tours
In Memory
Evan S. Connell
Evan S. Connell, an acclaimed and adventurous author, whose literary explorations ranged from Depression-era Kansas City in the twin novels "Mrs. Bridge" and "Mr. Bridge" to Custer's last stand in the history book "Son of the Morning Star: Custer and the Little Bighorn," was found dead Thursday, his niece said. He was 88.
Little known to the general public, but regarded fondly by critics, Connell was a National Book award finalist, a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters and a finalist in 2009 for the International Man Booker Award for lifetime achievement.
Connell was the author of 19 books, including two book-length poems, a biography of Spanish painter Francisco Goya and a historically detailed novel about the Crusades, "Deus Lo Volt!"
He wrote often of seekers and doubters, world travelers through the ages, and conventional folks who secretly yearned to break out.
The author himself was blessed with a curious and unpredictable mind, his subjects including alchemy, Antarctica, Nordic tales, Marco Polo, Mayan sculpture and the quest for gold in the New World.
His best-known books included his first novel, "Mrs. Bridge," published in 1959 and nominated for a National Book Award. His historical account of Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer came out in 1984 and was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle prize. It also was a best-seller and adapted for a network television miniseries.
The husband and wife movie stars, Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward, appeared in a 1990 film, "Mr. & Mrs. Bridge," based on Connell's twin novels, each written from the perspective of the title character.
Connell once said that the novels, published a decade apart, were "semi" autobiographical. They drew on his childhood experiences growing up in an upper-class family in the Midwest before World War II.
Connell was born in Kansas City, Mo., on Aug. 17, 1924, the son and grandson of physicians. His mother was the daughter of a judge.
Connell embarked on a literary career despite the wishes of his father, who wanted him to inherit the family medical practice.
"He was concerned that I would never be able to make a living at this kind of thing - it was a justifiable concern, I think," Connell told The Associated Press in 2000. "I grew up in a home where there was no music, no interest in any of the arts."
His most recent book was a collection of short stories published in 2008, "Lost in Uttar Pradesh."
He began writing while attending Dartmouth College. But he left in 1943 to enlist in the Navy, becoming a pilot and flight instructor. After the war, he returned to college and graduated from the University of Kansas in 1947 with a degree in English literature.
He studied creative writing at Stanford and Columbia universities, but unlike many authors he never taught, saying that campus life was too comfortable.
He traveled to Europe, and lived briefly in Paris before returning to the United States in the mid-1950s. At times, he took odd-jobs to support his literary pursuits. He once worked as an interviewer in an unemployment office in the San Francisco area, where he lived for more than three decades before moving to New Mexico in 1989. He never married.
The Santa Fe-based Lannan Foundation awarded Connell its $100,000 Literary Award for Lifetime Achievement in 2000.
Evan S. Connell
In Memory
Sol Yurick
A writer whose street gang novel "The Warriors" was adapted into a film of the same title that became a cult favorite has died. Sol Yurick was 87.
His daughter, Susanna Yurick, says the author died of complications from lung cancer early Saturday at Beth Israel Hospital in Manhattan.
A native and longtime resident of New York City, he drew upon his years working in the welfare department for his first book, "The Warriors," which came out in 1965. The movie was directed by Walter Hill and substantially changed from Yurick's book. It was released in 1979.
Yurick's other works included the novels "Fertig," ''An Island Death" and "The Bag," a story of race and class in New York that was his favorite.
Sol Yurick
In Memory
Claude Nobs
Claude Nobs, the founder and general manager of the Montreux Jazz Festival, whose passion for music and artistry introduced generations of legendary musicians to international audiences on the Swiss stage, has died. He was 76.
The Jazz Festival said Nobs, a native of Montreux, died Thursday after sustaining injuries from a fall while cross-country skiing nearby on Christmas Eve.
Nobs worked his way from being a chef and director of Montreux's tourism office, where he organized charity concerts, to overseeing one of the most iconic music festivals in the world.
It was from a visit to the New York offices of Atlantic Records that the first festival in his home city was born in June 1967, featuring musicians such as Keith Jarrett and Jack DeJohnette.
The festival was an overnight success, building over the decades on Nobs' passion for jazz, as much as his gumption and contacts abroad.
From that meeting in New York, Nobs went on to gain career-forming introductions to musical greats such as Roberta Flack and Aretha Franklin, who would make her first European tour at his request. The musical acts at the festival also would gradually broaden to include rock and pop.
An early incident involving the rock group Deep Purple, which had come to Montreux to record an album after performing with Frank Zappa, became forever linked with Nobs.
During a fire at Zappa's concert in 1971, Nobs rushed to save several young concert-goers. Deep Purple's hit song, "Smoke on the Water," would memorialize the accident - Nobs as "Funky Claude" pulling kids to safety.
Two years later, Nobs became director of the Swiss branch of Warner, Elektra and Atlantic, a position that gave him added clout to introduce heavyweights on the Montreux stage.
By the 1990s, he was sharing festival-directing duties with the music producer Quincy Jones and bringing in Miles Davis as an honorary host.
Nobs, whose enthusiasm for greeting musicians at his office and chalet home cemented his standing and boosted the profile of his home, also became known for occasionally taking the stage to play harmonica.
Claude Nobs
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