'TBH Politoons'
Thanks, again, Tim!
from Kip Shepherd
Protest Records
Sonic Youth's Thurston Moore has launched a new Web site,
Protest-Records.com, offering free MP3s of anti-war songs.
Among the songs now available on the site are Cat Power's "Rockets"
and "Maybe Not," the Beastie Boys' "In a World Gone Mad," Stephan
Smith's "Business," Eugene Chadbourne's "New New New War War War," and
a nine-minute cover of Bob Dylan's "Masters of War" by Geraldine
Fibbers' frontwoman Carla Bozulich with drummer Scott Amandola
(formerly of T.J. Kirk). Anne Waldman's poem "Rogue State" is also
featured.
According to the Protest-Records.com's mission statement, the site
"exists for musicians, poets and artists to express love and liberty
in the face of greed, sexism, racism, hate-crimes and war. Fight the
good fight."
In addition to the music and poetry, Protest Records' site includes
seven stencils to be downloaded, printed, cut out and spray-painted
over. Among the images are a skull and crossbones with George W. Bush's face subbing for
the former, and other icons with phrases including "Give Up War for
Lent" and "Sit In, Walk Out."
Protest Records
~ Kip Shepherd
Thanks, Kip! Good site!
Reader Link
The 'Anti-Ben & Jerry'
(Mail Order Ice Cream with a Conservative Flavor)
This is NOT a parody site.
~ Graham
Thanks, Graham!
Graham, who kicks ass in American trivia contests, lives in England. He & the ever-lovely Sharon visited the LA area a couple of summers back, and we all met up on the Queen Mary for brunch.
The Queen Mary brunch (one of my favorite ways to spend a Sunday morning in Long Beach), is held in the ship's Grand Ballroom. Real crystal, china, linens & silver. Great food. Ice Sculptures. And a harpist who plays
Led Zeppelin.
Reviews War Coverage
Mr. Cranky
excerpt:
"FOX NEWS:
Like an Iraqi soldier dressed in civilian clothes, Fox News has crept
in under the false cover of objectivity to unleash a blitzkrieg of bias
so right wing that channel-surfers often mistake it for a eugenics
infomercial. The only nod at an actual exchange of ideas is Hannity
bitch-slapping the hapless Colmes while slobbering permaguest Bill
Bennett slowly undoes his belt buckle in anticipation of giving that
liberal fucker his final comeuppance. It's enough the scare the teeth
right out of Ann Coulter's vag!na."
Mr. Cranky Reviews War Coverage
Thanks, Mr. Cranky!!
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Sunny morning, the Santa Ana winds showed up in the afternoon.
AOL was not available this morning for over 3 hours. Was happily surfing away when I got a message 'The form you requested is not available'. WTF? Eventually called aol, expecting to be told to re-boot from the disk, when they copped it was a problem on their end. Whew.
Did the Farmer's Market/CostCo loop. It's the season for the 'A' veggies - artichokes & asparagus (neither of which were in my old PA diet). And, CostCo had dozens of
'Food Ladies' present. Everything from steak to chicken cordon bleu to seafood salad to ice cream. Chips, popcorn, soda, and cream puffs, too.
Tonight, Friday, CBS is supposed to be ass-deep in 'March Madness', so it's either basketball or local programming.
On a RERUN Dave (from 1/10/03), are Kelsey Grammer, Chef Michael Tong, B.B. King, and Shemekia Copeland.
On a RERUN Craiggers are Adrien Brody, Sarah Chalke, the Wondermints.
NBC is supposed to air the schedule they dumped last Friday to facilitate the wargasm. First up, the Series Premiere of
'Search For The Most Talented Kid In America', followed by a FRESH (and new to Friday night) 'Ed', followed by a
FRESH 'Law & Order: Special Victims Unit'.
Scheduled on a FRESH Jay is The Great Regurgitator (think I'll skip this one).
Scheduled on a FRESH Conan are Chris Rock, Mark Addy, and Everclear.
Scheduled on a FRESH Carson Daly are Julie Bowen, Cuba Gooding Jr., and The Streets.
ABC is supposed to have a FRESH 'America's Funniest Home Videos', followed by a FRESH
'8 Simple Rules', then the Series Premiere of 'Regular Joe', and then '20/20'.
Scheduled on a FRESH Regis & Kelly Lee are Chris Rock and Aaron Eckhart.
Scheduled on a FRESH Jimmy Kimmel is Camp Freddy with this week's guest co-host Slash.
The WB is supposed to have a RERUN 'What I Like About You', followed by a RERUN
'Reba', then a FRESH 'Reba', followed by a FRESH 'Grounded For Life'.
Faux is supposed to offer a FRESH 'Fastlane', then a FRESH 'John Doe'.
UPN here has pre-season baseball, with the Disney Angles visiting Rupert's Doggers.
Check local PBS listings for 'NOW With Bill Moyers'.
HBO offers 'Real Time With Bill Maher'.
Showtime has 'Penn & Teller: Bullshit!'.
TCM offers one of the grand-daddies of American filmmaking tonight with 'Citizen Kane'.
Anyone have any opinions?
Or reviews?
(See below for addresses)
Cherry blossom trees start to bloom in Washington on the National Mall, on a warm spring Thursday, March 27, 2003. Notwithstanding the harsh winter, the National Park Service expected the trees would reach their peak bloom between April 5-12, before the April 7 end of the National Cherry Blossom Festival. The Capitol is in the background.
Photo by Teru Iwasaki
Musical Guests: David Bowie, and the Ghost of Woody Guthrie.
Takes On Egg Boy
Chris Rock
Comedian Chris Rock wants fans to know that contrary to reports from media gossip Matt Drudge, he "never had any intention of bashing President Bush" for launching the U.S.-led war in Iraq.
And yes, he would like all and sundry to know that his new movie, "Head of State," his directorial debut in which he plays a politician who ends up running for president, opens Friday -- that's this Friday, March 28 in theaters across the country.
"I never met Matt Drudge, but if I see Matt Drudge, I'm going to take my red-blooded American foot and put it up his un-American (backside) for trying to disrupt the opening of my movie," Rock said in a statement on Thursday.
The statement, was in response to an article by Drudge reporting that Rock "has been strongly advised" by executives of the film's distributor, DreamWorks SKG, "not to engage in any Bush-bashing."
Drudge said DreamWorks executives feared that Rock, who once said of Bush, "He's not stupid, he's just drunk," might spark a public backlash against the film if he made public comments ridiculing the president or the war in Iraq.
Chris Rock
Backs Away From Helping Bush With War In Iraq
Hollywood
Hollywood is refusing to be drafted to help the administration of resident George W. Bush sell its stance on the US-led war in Iraq, it was reported.
The US cinema industry's top lobbyist Jack Valenti, has told Washington that Tinseltown won't go into battle to promote the US point of view as it did after the September 11, 2001 terror attacks on American targets.
After the strikes, Hollywood -- encouraged by the White House -- scrambled to form a special war committee, which is headed by Valenti and which quickly produced several public service announcements and movie trailers boasting America's best qualities.
But Motion Picture Association of America president Valenti warned in Washington on Wednesday that producing films touting the war in Iraq would be explosive as many Hollywood personalities are virulently opposed to the conflict.
"We don't need to do PSAs (public service announcements) and all that blather," he told industry bible Daily Variety in an interview published Thursday.
But, he said, show business can play a different role in the conflict by providing US troops in the Middle East with copies of Hollywood movies for soldiers to watch.
"Only a deficient American wouldn't want to support them," he said. "So how best to support them? Offer them what they want?" he said adding that PSAs were not appropriate because "troops don't see the PSAs, for goodness sakes."
Hollywood
The Information One-Stop
Moose & Squirrel
Would Have Criticised Blair, Bush
John Lennon
John Lennon, would have "told off" British Prime Minister Tony Blair and US resident George W. Bush for waging war on Iraq, the Beatles' widow Yoko Ono revealed.
Ono, an ardent peace campaigner, was speaking in Liverpool, northwest England on Thursay, where Lennon's childhood home was officially being opened to the public.
"I'm sure John would have been terribly upset" about the war, if he were still alive, Ono told BBC radio.
"And I'm sure that he would have expressed his anger and told them off", she said, referring to Bush and Blair, about "how stupid it is to go through this".
"As Gandhi said, 'An eye for an eye will make us all blind'."
John Lennon
Toy vendor Amir Elsik, 16, plays with boxing puppets representing Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, right, and resident Bush, at the entrance to a toy shop in Gaza City, Thursday, March 27, 2003. Many Palestinians identify with Iraq, and Saddam remains popular in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
Photo by Darko Bandic
Forgo Issuing Apologies
Dixie Chicks
People shouldn't expect to hear anymore apologies from the Dixie Chicks.
The country trio's manager, Simon Renshaw, tells Radio and Records that lead singer Natalie Maines has released two strongly worded statements and that right now, he doesn't think she can win.
"If she goes on microphone and apologizes, they'll say she doesn't sound contrite enough," he said.
Maines reportedly told a London audience earlier this month, in reference to resident Bush's push for military action against Iraq, that she was ashamed the resident of the United States is from Texas. She later apologized, saying her remark was disrespectful.
Dixie Chicks
Dixie Chicks Web Site
The United Way & 36 Phone Calls
Susan Sarandon
The United Way of Tampa Bay has canceled an upcoming event featuring actress Susan Sarandon after getting three dozen complaints about her opposition to the war in Iraq.
The 56-year-old Academy Award winner was to be the keynote speaker at the April 11 event designed to inspire volunteerism in the community. Her brother, Terry Tomalin, outdoors writer at the St. Petersburg Times, asked her to participate in the event six months ago.
But when invitations went out about two weeks ago, the United Way received phone calls, e-mails and letters from donors and other criticizing Sarandon's selection as a speaker because of her anti-war views. Robin Carson, chairwoman of the United Way of Tampa Bay board of directors, said the event had the potential to become "divisive."
Sarandon was to be the featured speaker at the event's $75-a-plate luncheon in Tampa to talk about the role of women as leaders and contributors. Proceeds of the event were to go to the United Way.
Susan Sarandon
Records Duet With Bono
J.Lo
Jennifer Lopez revealed during a recent Internet chat on her official website that she has recorded a duet with U2 frontman Bono.
"I did a song with Bono and haven't released it yet," Lopez said. "We were waiting for the right timing to release it, and haven't released it yet, so it would be great if that saw the light of day one day." There's no official word on whether the duet with Bono will be released.
J.Lo
Not Proud of Marriage #2
Lisa Marie Presley
It was one of the oddest mergers in showbiz -- the furtive 1994 marriage between the self-proclaimed King of Pop and the daughter of the King of Rock 'n' Roll.
But Lisa Marie Presley said her attraction to Michael Jackson, the second of her three husbands, was real. In an interview with Rolling Stone magazine released on Thursday, she said she was turned on by his mysterious ways, wanted to protect him from child-abuse accusations and thought they could save the world together.
Yes, she did sleep with him. And no, she's not proud of the whole experience.
For a while Presley said she played the good wife -- kissed Jackson on stage at the MTV Video Music Awards in September 1994 at his manager's behest, and defended her husband during a 1995 TV joint interview with Diane Sawyer.
For his part Jackson would disappear for weeks on end, leaving her to deduce his whereabouts from the press, and he annoyed his wife by claiming in a TV Guide interview that she had said her father, Elvis Presley, had a nose job.
She demanded a divorce, and he gave her the silent treatment for a few more weeks.
The trauma sent her into a two-year mental and physical breakdown. She took to writing songs, and refers to Jackson in the track "Disciple," referring to his "masturbative ways."
"I'm not into Michael-bashing at all," Presley said of the track. "I know people want to know what that was about, and I'm trying to say it without making him a bad guy, you know ... It's hard to do, because it was such a bad situation and it was so f---ed up."
Lisa Marie Presley
In The Kitchen With BartCop & Friends
Criticizes Manufactured Pop Acts
Madonna
Madonna has blasted manufactured pop acts and a stream of TV talent searches, saying they're homogenizing the music world.
In excerpts released Thursday from an interview with British music magazine Q, the star accuses record chiefs of choosing new acts based on their marketing potential instead of their talent.
"I arrived at a different time, before the time of Svengalis holding talent searches — finding a girl that looks right and can carry a tune and then figuring a way to market her," Madonna is quoted as saying in the May issue of the magazine.
Referring to singers Pink, Christina Aguilera and Britney Spears, she said: "I'm not saying those girls can't grow into something, but I really don't know where we're going with the world. Everything's so homogenized."
Madonna, who has gained immense success by astutely marketing her own image, joins other music veterans, including Elton John and George Michael, who have criticized talent quests like Pop Idol, a British reality television show in which viewers choose a winner to get a record contract. The U.S. version of the show, American Idol, is in its second successful season.
Asked if she felt able to stop her 6-year-old daughter Lourdes from dressing how she wants, she said: "I can and I do."
Madonna
An animal handler holds four months old female Platypus 'puggle' twins at Taronga Zoo in Sydney, Australia, Friday, March 28, 2003. The Platypus, one of only two egg-laying mammals in the world is an enigmatic water dwelling nocturnal animal 35 to 45 cm (12 to 18 inches) long with a beaver-like tail and a duck-like bill.
Photo by Dan Peled
Opens Lennon's Childhood Home
Yoko Ono
Yoko Ono, the widow of murdered Beatle John Lennon, opened his childhood home in Liverpool on Thursday, expecting it to draw thousands of visitors every year.
Mendips, the modest suburban semi-detached house Lennon grew up in with his Aunt Mimi, was donated to the National Trust by Yoko Ono Lennon with the wish it be kept as a testimony to her late husband.
"When John's house came up for sale I wanted to preserve it for the people of Liverpool, and John Lennon and Beatles fans all over the world," she said in a statement.
John Lennon lived at Mendips, 251 Menlove Avenue, in Woolton, Liverpool from the age of five to 23, when he left to enjoy the fame and fortune derived from the astounding success of the Beatles.
The house has been restored as closely as possible to how it looked when Lennon lived there in the 1950s and early 1960s. It opens to the public on Saturday, March 29.
Yoko Ono
Woman With An Opinion
Cher
Don't ask Cher anything about the war, because she isn't watching. When "Entertainment Tonight" asked her if she, "like every other American," was tuning into the news networks," Cher said: "I absolutely will not . . . I don't like the way the news is portraying it. It's like they are portraying it like the ultimate reality show. I just think it's cheap."
Cher
Postponing Hong Kong
Rolling Stones
The lethal pneumonia outbreak in Southeast Asia has forced the Rolling Stones to postpone two concerts scheduled for this weekend in Hong Kong, a spokeswoman for the band said on Wednesday.
The veteran British rockers, currently on the Asian leg of their Licks world tour, were scheduled to perform at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Center on Friday and Saturday.
But increasing fears about Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), which is reported to have killed 50 people and made more than 1,300 sick, prompted the band to change its plans.
A spokeswoman said the rest of the tour will proceed. The next scheduled show is in Shanghai on April 1, marking the band's first ever performance in China. Other first-time shows will follow in Beijing, Bangkok and the Indian cities of Bangalore and Mumbai, formerly known as Bombay.
Rolling Stones
Time to Charge
Online Magazines
Time Inc., owned by AOL Time Warner said on Thursday it would charge for the online editions of 14 of its magazines starting with People and Entertainment Weekly on Monday.
People and Entertainment Weekly's Internet editions will be out of bounds to readers except to America Online members, subscribers to the specific magazines, or people who buy the newsstand edition.
In the following weeks, magazines such as Teen People, Real Simple and In Style will follow the same route.
Online Magazines
Formerly 'The Vidiot'
Retaining Name After Merger
Screen Actors Guild
The Screen Actors Guild (SAG) will survive, at least in name, if its planned merger with the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (AFTRA) goes through.
Maintaining the SAG name will likely help defuse potential opposition to the merger among the 98,000 SAG members, many of whom carry an emotional attachment from having qualified to join the guild.
The merger would create a still-unnamed umbrella union with three affiliates for actors, broadcasters and recording artists. Though no official announcement has been made, insiders say SAG leaders have already decided that the actors affiliate of the merged organization will keep the 70-year-old Screen Actors Guild name.
The current timetable provides for a joint consolidation committee to conduct three days of meetings starting Tuesday in Gotham, followed by an April 12-13 meeting of the two national boards to approve the detailed plan and set a member vote for June.
Screen Actors Guild
Rocks From Space Rain On Midwestern Homes
Meteor Shower
The midnight sky flashed an eerie blue early Thursday over four Midwestern states as a meteorite exploded in the atmosphere, sending rocks as big as softballs crashing through some houses.
Residents in Illinois, Indiana, Ohio and Wisconsin reported seeing the disintegrating meteorite flash across the sky about midnight. Police were soon deluged with reports of falling rocks striking homes and cars.
Commander Mike McNamara of the Park Forest Police Department said about 60 pieces of space rock ranging from gravel-sized to softball-sized were brought in to the police station.
He said three homes in Park Forest were damaged, along with the fire department and possibly one car. Two homes in the nearby town of Matteson also were struck by meteorite pieces.
Paul Sipiera, a professor of geology and astronomy at Harper College in Palatine, Ill., spent Thursday examining dozens of pieces of meteorites and plotting where they fell. The largest he saw was about 7 1/2 pounds.
He said the debris field appears to cover a path about 80 miles long by 20 miles wide from north of Bloomington, Ill., to Chicago's south side and possibly part of northwestern Indiana.
He said all of the pieces came from a stony meteorite he estimates was about the size of a Volkswagen bug when it exploded as it plunged into Earth's atmosphere.
Meteor Shower
Calls on U.S. to Ensure Free Press
Al-Jazeera
Banned on Wall Street and wiped off the Internet, Arab news channel al-Jazeera defended its controversial coverage of the Iraq war on Wednesday and demanded the United States come to its aid in the name of a free press.
Al-Jazeera, which angered Washington by showing footage of dead and captured American soldiers, voiced concern after two of its reporters were banned from the New York Stock Exchange and its Web sites were hacked.
The stock exchange stopped al-Jazeera broadcasts, saying credentials were only for networks that provided "responsible" coverage. Al-Jazeera was also denied a request to broadcast live from New York's Nasdaq exchange.
Al-Jazeera has taken the Arab world by storm since its launch in 1996, with its controversial reporting and brash, Western style drawing an audience of more than 35 million.
Media pundits said the New York Stock Exchange decision smacked of a dangerous opening salvo in a game of media tit-for-tat which could see Western media's access cut off. Iraq last week ordered CNN journalists to leave Baghdad.
"Clearly, it is a violation of press freedom," said Jeffrey Chester, executive director of the Center for Digital Democracy, a media watchdog group in Washington, D.C.
Al-Jazeera's new English-language Web site (http://english.aljazeera.net), which went live on Monday, and its Arabic-language site (
http://www.aljazeera.net) were downed by a hacker attack on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Al-Jazeera
'Happy to Be Alive'
Robert Blake
Robert Blake, 69, entered his formal plea after a preliminary hearing earlier this month that concluded there was sufficient evidence to put the former "Baretta" star on trial.
But the judge allowed Blake, who had spent 11 months in solitary confinement in jail, to be freed on $1.5 million bail pending trial. A trial date has not been set.
"I believe in the system," Blake told reporters on Thursday. "I'm standing in front of you and that's proof that this is still America and it still works. I'm just happy to be alive."
Robert Blake
Settle ABC Family Dispute
Disney & DirecTV
DirecTV and the Walt Disney Co. ended a contentious stand-off on Wednesday, saying they had reached an agreement for the nation's largest satellite service to continue carrying the ABC Family channel and other Disney networks.
DirecTV had said earlier this month that it would drop ABC Family at the end of March rather than pay a 35-percent price increase it said Disney was demanding.
A source familiar with the situation said that, beside ABC Family, the agreement also covered the SoapNet channel, DirecTV's rights to rebroadcast local ABC affiliates and some issues related to pay-per-view programming.
DirecTV had come under heavy fire for its plans to drop ABC Family from Christian broadcaster Pat Robertson, who founded the channel years ago and whose flagship program "The 700 Club" is still carried by Disney.
ABC Family stood to lose about 13 percent of its audience, or 11.3 million of 85 million homes, if DirecTV had pulled the channel from its basic package.
Disney & DirecTV
Prefer Iraqi Boots
British Troops
British soldiers have been scavenging the debris of war for Iraqi army boots because the British army variety are disintegrating in the hot desert sun.
Equipment shortages have affected British forces since their arrival in the Gulf.
Other soldiers are wearing patched-up combat trousers, repaired in one instance by removing a pocket, and in another case by cutting up a colleague's spare shirt.
For more details, British Troops
Battles Invading Fungus
Lascaux Caves
French scientists have launched a war against an insidious fungus that is attacking the Lascaux caves, the site of the world's most famous prehistoric paintings.
In its April issue, the French scientific journal La Recherche ("Research") says experts believe the fungus may have been accidentally introduced into the caves two years ago on the muddy boots of workmen.
The irony is that the workmen were overhauling an air-conditioning system to help preserve the 15,000-year-old paintings, which have been closed off to public view now for four decades.
The bug started to appear in June 2001 and has now been spotted on the floor, sloping walls and parts of the ceiling of the cave system, but so far has not affected any of the paintings, the report says.
The bug is a member of the Fusarium family which is a well-known agricultural pest.
Lascaux, located in wooded hills in the southwestern region of the Dordogne, was discovered by modern man in 1940.
During the 1950s, as many as a thousand people per day visited the cave. To accommodate them and bring in fresh air, the cave's entrance was widened, and this had a disastrous effect for it brought moisture, warmth and oxygen to the micro-organisms inside.
The cave was closed in 1963 after green algae began to grow on its walls. That pest was eliminated by chemical spray, used until 1998. A reproduction of the caves is open to the public, at a site a few hundred metres (yards) from the original.
For more, Lascaux Caves
In Memory
Paul Zindel
Playwright Paul Zindel, author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning "The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds" died Thursday. He was 66.
Zindel died of cancer at the Jacob Perlow Hospice in Beth Israel Medical Center in Manhattan, according to his daughter, Lizabeth Zindel.
Zindel was also the best-selling author of young-adult fiction, but it was "Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds," which starred Sada Thompson, that first brought him fame. The play about a young girl who lives with her abusive mother and epileptic sister opened off-Broadway in April 1970 and ran for nearly two years.
Originally written for television, "The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds" won the Pulitzer Prize for drama in 1971 and the following year was made into a movie starring Joanne Woodward and directed by Paul Newman.
Zindel's Broadway plays included "And Miss Reardon Drinks A Little" (1971), "The Secret Affairs of Mildred Wild" (1972) and "Ladies of the Alamo" (1977). He also wrote the screenplays for several movies including "Up the Sandbox" (1972), which starred Barbra Streisand, and "Mame" (1974), which had Lucille Ball in the title role.
Zindel also wrote more than two dozen books for children and young adults, starting in 1968 with "The Pigman." Other titles included "My Darling, My Hamburger" and "The Pigman's Legacy."
Paul Zindel
In Memory
Heinrich Neuy
Heinrich Neuy, one of the last representatives of the Bauhaus painting school, has died of heart disease in Steinfurt, northern Germany, his daughter said.
A trained carpenter, Neuy joined the Bauhaus art movement in 1930 and studied at its famed academy at Dessau, eastern Germany, until the Nazis shut it down in 1933.
The Bauhaus' youngest student, Neuy attended classes of famous German architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and Russian painter Wassily Kandinski, by whom he was deeply influenced.
The Bauhaus academy was founded by German architect Walter Gropius in Weimar, eastern Germany in 1919.
It revolutionised art by combining artistic creativity with functional, handicraft skills.
Bauhaus artists include German painters Paul Klee and Oskar Schlemmer as well as Hungarian photographer Laszlo Moholy-Nagy.
Heinrich Neuy
This watercolor on paper of a Cycad, or Encephalartos woodii, 1999, by Leslie Carol Berge, is one of the works of botanical art from around the world on exhibit at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History opening Friday, March 29, 2003.
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