Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Paul Constant: Black Hawk Rising (The Stranger)
If a Republican were in office right now, Osama bin Laden would still be in his compound, burning trash and slowly dying of old age.
Marc Dion: Two Beers and a Dead Bastard (Creators Syndicate)
What I remember, and I wrote about it at the time, was the voices of men saying "bastards" over and over and over again.
Paul Krugman's Blog: What Do You Mean We, White Man? Deficit Edition (New York Times)
But if we look at actual policy changes, it's hard to see that too much democracy was the problem. Remember, we had a budget surplus in 2000. Where did it go? The two biggest policy changes responsible for the swing into deficit were the big tax cuts of 2001 and 2003, and the war of choice in Iraq.
Paul Krugman's Blog: The Republican Descent Into Economic Darkness (New York Times)
Some of this is just partisanship: wanna bet that, say, John Taylor would be a lot more sympathetic to expansionary policies if his party held the White House? But the truth - which I suspect that people like Greg aren't willing to face, yet - is that the intellectual barbarians have completely overrun a party that even a few years ago was still capable of making sense.
Annie Lowrey: Putting the Squeeze on Jobless Benefits (Slate)
It's the wrong time to cut unemployment benefits, so why are Republican-run states doing it anyway?
Annie Lowrey: Don't Build Schools in Afghanistan (Slate)
The real lesson of the 'Three Cups of Tea' scandal.
William Deresiewicz: "Faulty Towers: The Crisis in Higher Education" (The Nation)
A few years ago, when I was still teaching at Yale, I was approached by a student who was interested in going to graduate school. She had her eye on Columbia; did I know someone there she could talk with? I did, an old professor of mine. But when I wrote to arrange the introduction, he refused to even meet with her. "I won't talk to students about graduate school anymore," he explained. "Going to grad school's a suicide mission."
Roger Ebert's Journal: The Way to a Man's Heart is Through His Stomach
As an aficionado of industrial design, I find the G-tube admirable. A small tunnel is opened above the belly button and leads directly into the stomach. Food passes through the tube. I dine. No fuss, no muss.
Dr. David Lipschitz: Diet Has Biggest Effect on Triglyceride Levels (Creators Syndicate)
Encouragingly, published in the journal 'Circulation,' a scientific statement by the American Heart Association (AHA) indicates that those who alter their lifestyle by eating a healthier diet can substantially reduce triglyceride levels. Replacing saturated fats (found in red meat) with healthy monounsaturated fats and increasing omega-3 fatty acid intake reduces triglycerides and promotes health. Good sources of omega-3 fatty acids include nuts (particularly walnuts), fatty fish and avocados.
Chuck Norris: Taming Tony the Tiger (Creators Syndicate)
While we might have the liberty to live off Twinkies, freedom is not an excuse for licentiousness. There is simply no justification for filling our kids' bellies full of highly processed junk ingredients in cereals or anything else, particularly to jumpstart their day for breakfast. Mostly, if we can't help our kids make right choices for breakfast, how will we ever expect them to make them on the bigger battlefields of life?
Lucy Mangan: I'm Having a Baby (Guardian)
'We've done seven dry runs to the hospital, none of them successful. The satnav, for some reason, refuses to believe such an institution exists.'
David Bruce has 41 Kindle books on Amazon.com with 250 anecdotes in each book. Each book is $1, so for $41 you can buy 10,250 anecdotes. Search for "Funniest People," "Coolest People, "Most Interesting People," "Kindest People," "Religious Anecdotes," and "Maximum Cool."
Hubert's Poetry Corner
"Joseph's Enigmatic Burden"
Some battles continue after the uniform is placed aside.
wrote:
answered:
Reader Suggestion
Michelle in AZ
From The Creator of 'Avery Ant'
BadtotheboneBob
A 'Q & A' with Shirley MacLaine
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Marine layer hung around most of the day.
Tribes Ready For Historic Return Of Buffalo
Montana
For the first time in nearly 140 years, the Indian tribes of northeastern Montana are preparing for the return of wild buffalo that are descended from herds that once thundered across the vast American West.
The Sioux and Assiniboine tribes of the Fort Peck Indian Reservation in coming months will claim dozens of buffalo originating from Yellowstone National Park, home to the last free-roaming, purebred bands of buffalo, or bison, in the United States.
On Monday, Montana wildlife officials plan to inspect 5,000 acres at Fort Peck that have been readied for the arrival of the native buffalo, which for centuries provided food, clothing and spiritual sustenance to American Indians.
The inspection marks a milestone in a years-long plan by federal, state and tribal managers of Yellowstone bison to give Native Americans in Montana custody of an assortment of bulls, cows and calves to cultivate new herds on tribal lands.
Montana
Fear-Mongering Over Quake Forecast
Rome
If tourists find Rome unusually quiet next Wednesday, the reason will probably be that thousands of locals have left town in fear of a devastating earthquake allegedly forecast for that day by a long-dead seismologist.
For months Italian internet sites, blogs and social networks have been debating the work of Raffaele Bendandi, who claimed to have forecast numerous earthquakes and, according to internet rumours, predicted a "big one" in Rome on May 11.
Bendandi, who died in 1979 aged 86, believed earthquakes were the result of the combined movements of the planets, the moon and the sun and were perfectly predictable.
However the current panic appears to be due more to fear-mongering in the age of internet than to Bendandi himself.
Paola Lagorio, the president of an association dedicated to Bendandi and which preserves all his manuscripts, says they make no reference to any earthquake around Rome in 2011.
Rome
Miles College
Bill Cosby
Comedian Bill Cosby encouraged graduates of Birmingham's Miles College to help rebuild the tornado-ravaged communities in Alabama.
Cosby told the graduates Saturday to look for ways to help the survivors of the April 27 storms that killed more than 200 people across the state. He said the graduates need to "work it, rebuild it."
He told the 207-member graduating class: "This is Alabama. This is you."
Cosby spent Friday touring the damage with college president George French and other officials. He also received an honorary doctorate from the historically black college.
Bill Cosby
Exhibit Opens At Motown Museum
Marvin Gaye
The Motown Historical Museum is celebrating the life and times, as well as the moves and grooves, of Marvin Gaye.
The Detroit museum, located in the original home of Motown Records Corp., has unveiled an exhibit chronicling the legendary artist's two decades at Motown, from 1960 to 1982. The exhibit in the second-floor gallery opened Friday and runs through at least September.
It's the first time the museum has produced a major exhibit on Gaye, and follows a successful installation on the Jackson 5 last year that marked the one-year anniversary of the death of Michael Jackson.
The largely chronological exhibit features Gaye's album covers, sheet music, costumes from concerts and even a Marvin Gaye Way street sign from Washington, D.C., the hometown of the man born Marvin Pentz Gay Jr. in 1939 and fatally shot by his father in 1984 after a violent argument.
Marvin Gaye
Love Letters Published
Edith Piaf
A set of love letters penned by Edith Piaf to her cycling champion lover Louis Gerardin have been published in France, where the late singer is as famous for her anguished love affairs as for her mournful ballads.
The great chanteuse's passionate months-long affair with the married Gerardin inspired a torrent of flowery, emotional missives, dotted with spelling mistakes and crossings-out, that reveal Piaf's fragility and desperate need to be loved back.
He was not Piaf's only paramour but it is the first time such heartfelt letters by the singer -- dubbed "La Mome Piaf," or little waif sparrow, as her mesmerizing presence propelled her from the streets of Paris to international stardom in the 1940s and 50s -- appear in a published collection.
Three years her senior at 39, Gerardin was the object of Piaf's passion from November 1951 to September 1952, during which time she wrote over 50 letters to her lover, nicknamed "Toto."
Edith Piaf
Pilot Has A Problem
Delta
Two Muslim scholars headed to a conference on American fears of Islam were pulled from a morning flight on Friday, and were later told that the pilot had refused to fly with them aboard.
Masudur Rahman, a professor of Arabic at the University of Memphis, and Mohamed Zaghloul, Imam at the Islamic Association of Greater Memphis, were asked to deplane Atlantic Southeast Airlines flight 5452 from Memphis to Charlotte. They were subjected to additional security checks after the plane had pushed back from the gate, Rahman told Reuters by telephone.
After additional screening, the two men were cleared by Delta representatives to re-board the plane, but were then told the pilot would not take them, Rahman said.
Rahman said both men had been cleared for check-in and boarding by airline and Transportation Security Administration officials during normal pre-flight procedures.
Rahman said Delta officials told them it was not passengers who were uncomfortable with the men's presence, but the pilot.
Delta
Replacing T-rump In Indy 500 Pace Car
A.J. Foyt
A.J. Foyt will drive the pace car for this month's Indianapolis 500, race officials said on Friday after Donald T-rump turned down the honour a day earlier because of a possible U.S. presidential run.
The 100th edition of the Indianapolis 500 on May 29 will be the 50-year anniversary since Foyt, the event's first four-time winner, first won at the famed Brickyard.
The 76-year-old tough as nails Texan has been around nearly as long as the speedway itself, having competed in the Indy 500 as a driver or team owner for 54 years.
He made a record 35 consecutive starts as a driver from 1958-92 and led a record 13 races. He also completed a record 12,272.5 career miles in the race.
A.J. Foyt
Super-Rich Get Even Richer
Britain
Britain's richest people got collectively wealthier by 18 percent as the rest of the country weathered harsh government cuts, according to an annual list published Sunday.
Indian-born steel tycoon Lakshmi Mittal retained the top spot in The Sunday Times Rich List for a seventh straight year, despite seeing about £5 billion ($8 billion, 5.7 billion euros) wiped off his fortune.
The 1,000 richest people in Britain saw their wealth continue to bounce back from the recession and increase to a collective fortune of £395.8 billion.
The number of billionaires in Britain now stands at 73 -- up from 53 last year and almost matching the record of 75 set in the list of 2008 before the financial crisis. Forty are British-born.
Britain
Holy Deposits
Ram Ram Bank
In a bank with no security gates, guards or locks, deposits from thousands of customers from across India are stacked on shelves, protected from theft by the grace of God.
I
n a cramped room in a small house in the north Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, Ram Ram Bank offers no interest or loans, but has around 5,000 customers who flock to deposit documents bearing God's name.
The bank's customers scribble "Ram," the protagonist in the Indian mythological epic Ramayana, on pieces of paper as many as 100,000 times and deposit them in the bank. Ram is also known as Rama.
Religion is no barrier. Hindus, Sikhs and Muslims write the name of Ram in their native languages.
Every six months the stacks of "deposits" are sent to be displayed in a temple in Ayodhya, the birth place of Ram.
Ram Ram Bank
Caught In Birther Flap
Piyush Jindal
A photo of Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal's birth certificate was published by a newspaper on Saturday even though there is no doubt the Indian American Republican was born in the United States.
Jindal, who is not running for president in 2012 but is mentioned as a possible vice presidential running mate, released the certificate to prove a newspaper editorial wrong.
The flap started when Jindal said last month that he would sign a state bill, if it reached his desk, that would require candidates for federal office on the Louisiana ballot to show proof of birth in the U.S.
After Jindal endorsed the Louisiana "birther" bill, the Baton Rouge daily newspaper, The Advocate, on April 22 published a critical editorial.
Piyush Jindal
Mass Circumcision
Philippines
Hundreds of boys in a Philippine city turned out Saturday for a daylong "circumcision party" to provide a safe, free procedure for a rite of passage that most local males undergo as preteens.
Some boys cried in their mothers' arms while others bit their shirts to stifle sobs as doctors carried out the surgery on dozens of makeshift operating tables inside a sports stadium in Marikina city east of Manila. Outside, other boys lined up to await their turn.
Officials said the event - touted in a press statement as a "circumcision party" - aims to promote safe circumcision and to offer to poor residents free surgery that would otherwise cost at least $40 in private hospitals.
In the Philippines, preadolescent and adolescent boys traditionally are circumcised during summer school break from March to May. In rural areas, the surgery is sometimes performed by non-doctors using crude methods.
Philippines
Weekend Box Office
`Thor'
"Thor" kicked off the summer movie season by smashing the competition at the box office with a $66 million opening weekend.
The 3-D action picture from Paramount, based on the Marvel comic, was by far the No. 1 movie, according to Sunday studio estimates.
In second place was a holdover from last week, the car-racing sequel "Fast Five" from Universal Pictures. It made $32.5 million for a total of nearly $140 million in just 10 days.
In limited release, Summit Entertainment's "The Beaver," starring Mel Gibson as a depressed man who communicates through a beaver hand puppet, made $104,000 at 22 theaters. Directed by and co-starring Jodie Foster, the dramedy marks Gibson's first major role since a series of off-screen rants and scandals tarnished his reputation. It expands nationwide May 20.
Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to Hollywood.com. Final figures will be released Monday.
1. "Thor," $66 million.
2. "Fast Five," $32.5 million.
3. "Jumping the Broom," $13.7 million.
4. "Something Borrowed," $13.2 million.
5. "Rio," $8.2 million.
6. "Water for Elephants," $5.6 million.
7. "Tyler Perry's Madea's Big Happy Family," $3.9 million.
8. "Prom," $2.4 million.
9. "Soul Surfer," $2.1 million.
10. "Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil," $1.9 million.
`Thor'
In Memory
Sada Thompson
Sada Thompson, the durable matriarch of stage and screen who won a Tony Award for her portraits of three sisters and their mother in the 1971 comedy "Twigs" and an Emmy Award for playing the eternally understanding mother in the television series "Family," has died at age 81.
Thompson won wide acclaim during an illustrious career that spanned more than 60 years, during which she gravitated toward quality work that allowed her to plumb her characters' complexities.
Even before she graduated in 1949 from Pittsburgh's Carnegie Mellon University, then called the Carnegie Institute of Technology, she was on a trajectory to take on challenging roles drawn from the classics as well as contemporary plays.
A prolific actress, she made her mark in theater and film generally portraying the matriarchs in family dramas.
In her stage debut in 1945, she played Nick's Ma in William Saroyan's "The Time of Your Life." She was Mrs. Higgins in "Pygmalion" (1949), the resentful matriarch determined not to hurt again in "Real Estate" (1987), the embattled Mrs. Fisher in the 1991 comedy "The Show-Off," the slovenly and bitter mother, Beatrice, in the 1965 production of "The Effect Of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds" and Dorine in "Tartuffe" (1965). She collected Obies for the latter two.
By far, her biggest Broadway success was "Twigs," by George Furth, in which she played three sisters - as well as their mother. The play took its title from a line by Alexander Pope: "Just as the twig is bent, the tree's inclined." She won a Tony and the New York Drama Critics Award that season.
In the late `70s, she picked up an Emmy for her portrayal of the levelheaded Kate Lawrence in the ABC drama "Family," which ran for five seasons.
Born Sada Carolyn Thompson on Sept. 27, 1929, in Des Moines, Iowa, she got her unusual name from her maternal grandmother, whose name, Sarah, was turned into Sada. Her parents moved to New Jersey when she was 5, and her fascination with the stage began soon thereafter. Her parents would often take her to a summer theater where plays would stop on their way to Broadway or before they began their national tours.
In 1956, she won a Drama Desk Award for Moliere's "The Misanthrope" and for an English girl mourning the death of her half-brother in war in "The River Line" (1957). She was nominated for an Emmy for her portrayal of Carla's mother in the NBC comedy "Cheers" (1991).
Thompson met and married a fellow drama student, Donald Stewart, at the Carnegie Institute of Technology in 1949. Their daughter is a costume designer.
Sada Thompson
In Memory
Dana Wynter
Dana Wynter, who ran from the Pod People in the 1956 science-fiction classic "Invasion of the Body Snatchers," has died in Southern California. She was 79.
Her son, Mark Bautzer, told the Los Angeles Times the actress died Thursday in Ojai of congestive heart failure.
Wynter, who starred in a number of television dramas in the 1960s, was best known for her role as Becky Driscoll in director Don Siegel's paranoid film about townspeople being replaced by emotionless duplicates grown from plant-like pods.
Born in Germany, Wynter grew up in England and studied to be a doctor before turning to acting.
She appeared with Robert Lansing in the ABC series "The Man Who Never Was," and starred in "Wagon Train," "Cannon" and "The Rockford Files."
Dana Wynter
In Memory
Gunter Sachs
German-born photographer Gunter Sachs, best known for his playboy lifestyle and brief marriage to French actress Brigitte Bardot, has committed suicide. He was 78.
In a statement released Sunday by his family at his request, Sachs said he chose to end his life after concluding that he was suffering from an incurable degenerative disease affecting his memory and ability to communicate.
Sachs was born into a wealthy industrialist family in 1932, and used his inheritance and business acumen to fund a glamorous lifestyle that fascinated many in post-war Germany of the 1960s and 70s.
Sachs also made a name for himself as a photographer, documentary filmmaker and art collector. Swiss business magazine Bilanz estimated his fortune at 300-400 million Swiss francs ($340-$455 million).
Sachs is survived by Bardot, to whom he was married from 1966-1969, his third wife Mirja Larsson and their sons Christian and Alexander, and son Rolf from his first marriage.
Gunter Sachs
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