Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Matthew Delmont: TV's first interracial kiss launched a lifelong career in activism (The Conversation)
On Nov. 22, 1968, an episode of "Star Trek" titled "Plato's Stepchildren" broadcast the first interracial kiss on American television.
Sam Adams: Michael Moore's New Movie Is a Much-Needed Punch to the Gut (Slate)
Fahrenheit 11/9 is a rousing piece of propaganda and a worthy successor to the highest-grossing documentary of all time.
Lucy Mangan: Back-to-school blues? Buy yourself a lovely new notebook (The Guardian)
Whether decadently leatherbound or no-nonsense utilitarian, there is nothing like the blank pages of a pristine new notebook to inspire and uplift
Lucy Mangan: But who gets the vase? The day my sister and I chose what to keep when our parents die (The Guardian)
But who gets the vase? The day my sister and I chose what to keep when our parents die
Lucy Mangan: "Can tarot bring about the future we want?" (Stylist)
It's tempting, of course, to turn elsewhere when the rational brief to which society has customarily cleaved seems to be paying fewer dividends every day. But the answer to madness is not to take refuge in more madness. It's closer and more conscious scrutiny of everything, that will bring about the future we want. That's what the turn of the cards showed me. Though the odd walk in the sun might help too.
Lucy Mangan: "Why every woman should read the feminist short story 'The Yellow Wallpaper'" (Stylist)
"I firmly believe it saved me from ?a world of dating pain, uncertainty and misdirected energy," says Lucy Mangan.
Lucy Mangan: "What University Challenge teaches us about how women experience the world" (Stylist)
While male University Challenge contestants are celebrated, women are picked apart. But we shouldn't let fear of criticism stop us pursuing our goals, says Lucy Mangan.
Daniel Politi: Dallas Cop Kills Neighbor After Going Into His Apartment Thinking it Was Her Own (Slate)
In a very case that still seems to have a lot of open questions, a Dallas police officer will be facing manslaughter charges after she shot and killed a 26-year-old man in his own apartment. The officer, who has not been identified, thought she had gone into her own apartment when she had actually gone into her neighbor's home and apparently thought he was an intruder.
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Presenting
Michael Egan
took the day off.
has returned to semi-retired status.
In memory.
Reader Suggestion
Michelle in AZ
from Bruce
Audience Anecdotes
• Some music fans who have attended the New York Metropolitan Opera House in the past have not lacked in chutzpah. One woman requested that the Met perform the aria "Celeste Aïda" in the third act rather than the first because she was accustomed to arriving at the opera late.
• In the Broadway hit The Streets of Paris, Lou Costello of Abbott and Costello fame occasionally stepped out of character. If a woman in the audience began to leave, Mr. Costello would yell at her, "Hey, lady, don't leave; we ain't finished yet."
• Alexander Woollcott and George S. Kaufman once collaborated on an unsuccessful play titled The Dark Tower. About this play, Mr. Woollcott said that "it was a tremendous success except for the minor detail that people wouldn't come to see it."
• John Gielgud and Mrs. Patrick Campbell once played to nearly empty houses in Ibsen's Ghosts, and so Mrs. Campbell occasionally remarked to Mr. Gielgud on stage, "The Marquis and Marchioness of Empty are in front again."
• Once, conductor Sir Thomas Beecham was annoyed by a noisy audience at a Covent Garden concert. In the middle of Fidelio, Sir Thomas suddenly whirled around, faced the audience, and shouted, "Stop talking!"
• After the opening night performance of his play Home Chat, Noel Coward came forward to take a bow. A voice from the audience called out, "We expected better." Mr. Coward replied, "So did I."
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© Copyright Bruce D. Bruce; All Rights Reserved
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Bonus Links
Jeannie the Teed-Off Temp
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
'#TFA'
PRESIDENT LIAR!
Visit JD's site - Kitty Litter Music
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
If you've ever thought about sending Marty a donation this would be an excellent time.
3,000 Coat Hangers, So Far
Susan Collins
As a reminder of what could be at stake if President-for-now Donald Trump's (R-OfPutin) latest Supreme Court pick is confirmed, abortion rights activists have been sending Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) coat hangers for months.
Around 3,000 have been delivered so far to the office of the senator, The Associated Press reported Saturday. Collins is considered to be a key vote in the upcoming confirmation vote for Trump's nominee, Brett Kavanaugh.
Many supporters of abortion rights fear Kavanaugh would dismantle the landmark 1973 abortion case Roe v. Wade ? in no small part because that's precisely what Trump promised during his campaign. Given the chance, Trump said, he would nominate judges to the Supreme Court who would significantly roll back Roe v. Wade. Collins, a centrist, supports abortion rights.
While Collins has vowed to oppose any Supreme Court candidate who "demonstrated hostility" to Roe v. Wade, whether she believes Kavanaugh has done so in his career remains unclear. She has declined to indicate publicly what her decision may be. Although Collins said Kavanaugh told her that he considered the case "settled law," his critics are concerned about past rulings and an email he sent suggesting Roe v. Wade could be overturned.
Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), another centrist generally supportive of abortion rights, has similarly not indicated which way she will vote. In addition to the issue posed by Kavanaugh's abortion record, advocates for Native Alaskan groups have urged the senator to vote no, and Native Alaskans were key to Murkowski's election.
Susan Collins
Christian Siriano's NYFW Show
Cynthia Nixon
Christian Siriano worked to get out the vote for Cynthia Nixon in the upcoming New York gubernatorial election at his show Saturday during New York Fashion Week.
Amongst the tropical-print looks and neon green gowns, the designer featured a simple, black T-shirt that said "Vote for Cynthia" at his spring/summer 2019 show, and his encouragement for people to vote for the former "Sex and the City" star in her run for governor didn't end there.
Nixon didn't only appear on T-shirts: She was seated in the front row for the show at Manhattan's Gotham Hall.
A campaign flyer for "Cynthia for New York" was placed on each seat before the start of the show. Siriano even gave her a special thanks in the show notes.
The designer also made a statement with his own shirt when he ran through the venue at the end of the show. His shirt said, "I'm voting for Cynthia."
Cynthia Nixon
Feels Isolated
Olivia Munn
Olivia Munn says she feels ostracized by her fellow "The Predator" castmates after speaking out about convincing Fox to remove a scene from the monster movie that she unknowingly did with a registered sex offender.
This past week, Los Angeles Times reported that director Shane Black had cast longtime friend Steven Wilder Striegel for a cameo role in "The Predator," as he had done for past films. The scene was a short, three-page dialogue between him and Munn.
But after shooting wrapped, Munn discovered that Striegel had pled guilty to two charges in 2010 after being accused of sexually propositioning a teenager by email. After notifying Fox of Striegel's history, the scene was removed.
Black, Munn, and the film's cast - including Boyd Holbrook, Trevante Rhodes and Keegan Michael-Key - gathered this weekend at the Toronto International Film Festival for the film's premiere, but in an interview with Vanity Fair, Munn said that she has been left on her own to discuss the removed scene with reporters, with one co-star even walking off an interview he was doing with Munn when the topic was brought up.
"Right now the reality is that there will be people who wear Time's Up pins and say they support Time's Up, [but] there will be people in Time's Up who aren't really down with the cause," she said.
Olivia Munn
Fishermen Haul in Monstrous Skull and Antlers
Irish Elk
Fishermen in Northern Ireland pulled in the catch of a lifetime on Wednesday (Sept. 5), when they caught an enormous Irish elk skull that's estimated to be more than 10,500 years old. The impressive specimen is about 6 feet (1.8 meters) across and is almost fully intact.
Raymond McElroy and his assistant, Charlie Coyle, caught the massive antlers in their fishing net in the northwest region of Lough Neagh, a large freshwater lake. The men were fishing in water no more than 20 feet (6 meters) deep, about a half mile from shore, said Pat Grimes, a local historian who shared his photos of the impressive discovery.
Irish elk (Megaloceros giganteus) have been extinct for more than 10,000 years, and were one of the largest deer species to ever roam the Earth, according to the University of California Museum of Paleontology. The name Irish elk is a bit of a misnomer on both parts, in that they're technically deer, and were found well beyond Ireland - they were present throughout Europe, northern Asia and northern Africa. Still, remains of these large beasts have been found in the bogs and lakes of Ireland more often than other parts of the world.
In recent years, the lakebed of Lough Neagh has proved to be a relatively bountiful spot for skeletal remains of the extinct giant deer. In 1987, a fisherman named Felix Conlon netted a set of antlers attached to a skull that he gave to a local school to display, Grimes told Live Science. Then in 2014, another fisherman, Martin Kelly, found a lower jawbone from an Irish elk estimated to be at least 14,000 years old by Kenneth James, the curator of the Ulster Museum in Belfast, Northern Ireland.
The deer lived in Ireland when the weather was suitable on the grass plains, but years later, forests began to grow, Mike Simms, a paleontologist at the Ulster Museum, told BelfastLive. Unfortunately for the large beasts, "giant antlers aren't great in the forest," Simms said. "Environmental change is what caused their extinction."
Irish Elk
Oink. Oink.
Moonves
Six more women have raised sexual assault and harassment claims against CBS Corp (CBS.N) Chief Executive Leslie Moonves in a report published on Sunday in the New Yorker magazine, while the media company has reached an exit agreement with him.
Moonves' resignation, following similar claims made by six other women against him, could be announced as early as Monday morning, according to sources familiar with the matter who asked not to be identified because the plans had not been made public.
The newly disclosed incidents, which the women said occurred between the 1980s and early 2000s, were published in the New Yorker story and included claims of forced sex, Moonves exposing himself and use of physical violence and intimidation. All six of the women were named in the article.
The New Yorker reported that these women said Moonves also retaliated after they rebuffed him, damaging their careers.
In a statement to the magazine, Moonves acknowledged three of the encounters, but said they were consensual.
Moonves
Opioid Pushers
Sackler Family
Richard Sackler and his billionaire family, who have been blamed for fostering the nation's ongoing opioid epidemic, own a second pharmaceutical company.
The Sacklers are the owners of Purdue Pharma, which created the addictive opioid painkiller OxyContin. But the family also own a second company based in Rhode Island, Rhodes Pharma, according to a Financial Times report released Sunday.
Purdue Pharma and Rhodes Pharma combined were responsible for 14.4 million opioid prescriptions in the U.S.
The Sacklers are worth a combined $13 billion, according to a 2016 Forbes report. The vast majority of their wealth, shared among 20 family members, is derived from drug-making.
Purdue Pharma has faced hundreds of lawsuits over the years for fueling the opioid epidemic. More than 63,000 people in the U.S. died from drug overdoses in 2016, of which 66 percent were related to opioid use.
Sackler Family
Memories Spring To Life
Watergate
The White House seethes with intrigue and backstabbing as aides hunt for the anonymous Deep (state) Throat among them. A president feels besieged by tormentors - Bob Woodward is driving him crazy - so he tends his version of an enemies list, wondering aloud if he should rid himself of his attorney general or the special prosecutor or both.
For months, the Trump administration and its scandals have carried whiffs of Watergate and drawn comparisons to the characters and crimes of the Nixon era. But this week, history did not just repeat itself, it climbed out of the dustbin and returned in the flesh.
There was John Dean again, testifying on the Hill, warning anew about a cancer on the presidency.
Nearly every element in President Donald Trump's trouble has a Watergate parallel.
But in those days, the world did not have Twitter or a U.S. president who would have been publicly airing his visceral feelings on it even if he could.
Watergate
Landslide and Tsunami
Alaska
A massive landslide and tsunami that denuded the slopes of an Alaskan fjord could reveal warning signs that could help predict future disasters.
In a new paper, researchers described the geological fingerprints of the tsunami, which tore through Taan Fjord on Oct.17, 2015, at an estimated 100 mph (162 km/h). Using satellite imagery and field-based measurements, the team discovered that the slope was displaying signs of instability for at least two decades before it failed.
The "geologic evidence can help [us] understand past occurrences of similar events and might provide forewarning," the researchers wrote Thursday (Sept. 6) in the journal Scientific Reports.
Taan Fjord sits in Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve in southeastern Alaska. The rugged landscape is dotted with glaciers, including the Tyndall Glacier, which used to fill the entirety of Taan Fjord. Between 1961 and 1991, however, the glacier retreated 10.5 miles (17 kilometers) to the end of the fjord.
As glaciers retreat and permafrost melts, the rocky hillsides once supported by all that ice become unstable, wrote the team of researchers led by the University of Washington Tacoma's Dan Shugar and environmental nonprofit Ground Truth Trekking's Bretwood Higman. The situation is made worse by Alaska's restive nature; minor earthquakes regularly jolt the fjord walls.
Alaska
Weekend Box Office
'The Nun'
The horror movie "The Nun" has topped the domestic box office in its first weekend, scoring a best for the "Conjuring" franchise and another win for Warner Bros.
Studio estimates on Sunday say the Demian Bichir and Taissa Farmiga-led film brought in $53.5 million from 3,876 North American theaters. Internationally, it banked $77.5 million for a massive $131 million global debut. The movie, a spinoff of a character seen in "The Conjuring 2" and set in 1952 Romania, cost only $22 million to produce.
"The Nun" effectively scared "Crazy Rich Asians" into second place for the first time in its four-week run. The rom-com added $13.6 million, bringing its total North American earning to $136.2 million.
Third place went to the R-rated Jennifer Garner revenge movie "Peppermint," from STXFilms, which debuted on par with expectations to $13.3 million.
"'Peppermint' was a movie that was meant to give a completely different option to 'The Nun,'" said Paul Dergarabedian, a senior media analyst for box office tracker comScore. "'The Nun' was just this overwhelming juggernaut."
Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to comScore. Where available, the latest international numbers for Friday through Sunday are also included. Final domestic figures will be released Monday.
1."The Nun," $53.5 million ($77.5 million international).
2."Crazy Rich Asians," $13.6 million ($5.6 million international).
3."Peppermint," $13.3 million ($1.4 million international).
4."The Meg," $6 million ($11.3 million international).
5."Searching," $4.5 million ($7.5 million international).
6."Mission: Impossible - Fallout," $3.8 million ($38.6 million international).
7."Christopher Robin," $3.2 million ($2.5 million international).
8."Operation Finale," $3 million.
9."BlacKkKlansman,"$2.6 million ($3.7 million international).
10. "Alpha," $2.5 million ($6.3 million international).
'The Nun'
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